October 2, 2007
Earlier today, Pervez Musharraf named his successor as army chief of staff as he prepared to stand for election for the presidency he has held after a 1999 coup. Now he has apparently cinched a deal for the support of moderate Benazir Bhutto as the government officially granted the former Prime Minister amnesty against corruption allegations that Musharraf used as an excuse to grab power: Pakistan agreed to grant former prime minister Benazir Bhutto an amnesty on corruption charges Tuesday as President Pervez Musharraf named a new army chief just days before he seeks re-election. The day of dramatic developments came as military strongman Musharraf, a key US ally who seized power in 1999, faced growing opposition to his plan to win another five-year term in Saturday's presidential vote. The move to drop a raft of graft charges against Bhutto, who has vowed to return to Pakistan on October 18,...
October 5, 2007
Pervez Musharraf and Benazir Bhutto have reached a deal on power-sharing that they will announce today. It will clear a path for both Bhutto's return and Musharraf's election as civilian president, returning Pakistan to democracy. It will also provide a stronger and more moderate alliance to face off against the radicals in Pakistan, or so the US hopes: President Pervez Musharraf and former prime minister Benazir Bhutto have reached tentative agreement on a deal that is designed to give his election more credibility and allow her to return to Pakistan without facing corruption charges, officials on both sides said Friday. The deal, which followed months of seesaw negotiations, was expected to be formally announced later Friday, the eve of a planned presidential vote in the national and provincial assemblies. .... Musharraf has the support he needs to win a new five-year term, but Bhutto's party had threatened to join other...
October 6, 2007
Pervez Musharraf took another giant step towards his transformation from a military dictator to a civilian leader today. He won his election to the presidency with little trouble from his rivals, but he has to await a ruling eleven days from now by the Supreme Court to determine whether he can take office: Pakistan's military ruler Pervez Musharraf won a landslide victory in a controversial presidential election Saturday but the Supreme Court might yet snatch another five-year term away from him. Musharraf, a key US ally who seized power in the world's only nuclear-armed Islamic country in a 1999 coup, swept to an easy win over token rivals in the vote by national and provincial parliaments. But the embattled general must now await a decision by the Supreme Court, which said Friday that the winner cannot be officially declared until at least October 17 while it hears legal challenges. It...
October 7, 2007
Islamist extremists in Pakistan see their opening for control of the country slipping away with the new power-sharing deal between Pervez Musharraf and Benazir Bhutto. After the completion of the deal, radical Islamists have threatened to assassinate Bhutto if she returns to Pakistan, afraid of the burgeoning moderate coalition that threatens to further marginalize them: Pakistani Taliban militants vowed to launch suicide bombers against Benazir Bhutto, the former prime minister, when she returns home after eight years of self-imposed exile. The path to her return was cleared when General Pervez Musharraf, Pakistan's president, last week signed into law an amnesty quashing corruption charges against her. The general swept to apparent victory yesterday in a presidential vote by federal and provincial politicians. He is likely to form an alliance with Ms Bhutto as premier after parliamentary polls in January – though his election must first be pronounced valid by the supreme...
October 8, 2007
The Pakistani Army attacked Islamist bases in Waziristan yesterday after one of their checkpoints came under fire. When the dust had settled, 58 combatants had died, and Musharraf may have sent a message about his post-election plans: At least 58 people, including 16 soldiers, have been killed in clashes between Pakistani troops and militants in the North Waziristan region. Security forces struck militant bases after a checkpoint was attacked in the Mir Ali area, the army said. ... Military spokesman Maj Gen Waheed Arshad said: "The operation is over but some clashes are still going on in other areas." Heavy artillery and helicopter gunships were used to attack militants' positions in mountains after the attack on the checkpoint near Mir Ali town. Musharraf has vacillated on pressing the point against the Islamists in the northwest over the last couple of years. Even after his truce fell apart with the tribes...
October 9, 2007
The fighting continues in Pakistan's Northwest Province, where radical Islamst extremists have had an easy time of it until the last three months. Over 150 Taliban and al-Qaeda militants have been killed in the last three days of fighting, and Pervez Musharraf appears to have decided to fight with everything he's got: At least 45 Pakistani soldiers and 150 pro-Taleban militants have died in three days of fierce fighting in North Waziristan, the Pakistani army says. It is the heaviest fighting in the Waziristan region, which borders Afghanistan, for many months. ... The three days of fighting is centred around the town of Mir Ali. The BBC's Barbara Plett in Islamabad says that Mir Ali is known as a base for foreign militants with links to the Taleban and al-Qaeda. Musharraf has begun using his air power in Waziristan. The attacks near Mir Ali include helicopter gunships, in a similar...
October 17, 2007
Benazir Bhutto will defy Pervez Musharraf's request for more time and stage a very public return to Pakistan tomorrow. The former Prime Minister plans to land in Karachi, and hopes to see large crowds greet her to underscore her popularity -- and to send a message to both Musharraf and the radical Islamists, who'd like to kill them both: Former Pakistani Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto has confirmed that she will end more than eight years of self-imposed exile on Thursday. President Musharraf had asked her to delay the return until the Supreme Court decides on whether he is eligible to be president for another term. ... "At this time tomorrow, we'll be on board the plane to Karachi, which is a day that I and all the people in Pakistan who love democracy and believe in fundamental human rights, have been waiting for," she said. She is planning a high-profile...
October 18, 2007
Former Prime Minister Benazie Bhutto returned to Pakistan in triumph today, with thousands of supporters cheering her arrival despite heavy security precautions in Karachi. A tearful Bhutto may not have generated the million people for which she hoped, but the turnout was nonetheless impressive: Authorities have mounted a massive security operation to protect the 54-year-old from possible attack by Islamic militants. But the precautions failed to dampen the spirit of huge crowds forming in Karachi. Hundreds of buses and other vehicles festooned with billboards welcoming her back were parked bumper-to-bumper along the boulevard from the airport to the city center. A huge red, green and black flag of her Pakistan People's Party hung from one apartment block overlooking the route. Supporters including representatives of Pakistan's minority Christian and Hindu communities and Baluch tribesmen with flowing white turbans, walked toward the airport, while groups of men performed traditional dances, beat drums...
Earlier today, I wrote about Benazir Bhutto's triumphal return to Pakistan. She traveled in a procession in Karachi to celebrate her return in defiance of an assassination threat -- and found herself in the center of a bombing that killed dozens in the crowd of 150,000 celebrants: Two explosions went off Thursday night near a truck carrying former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto on her celebratory return to Pakistan after eight years in exile. Police said she was unhurt, but officials and witnesses said up to 45 people were killed and more than 100 wounded. An initial small explosion was followed by a huge blast just feet from the front of the truck carrying Bhutto during a procession through Karachi. The blast shattered windows in her vehicle. Neither Bhutto nor any of the others riding on the truck was hurt, police officer Hasib Beg said. Karachi police chief Azhar Farooqi told...
October 19, 2007
Pakistani security officials confirmed the obvious today, announcing that the bombings showed classic hallmarks of an al-Qaeda attack. The death toll rose to 136, making it AQ's most effective terrorist attack in years, but the failure to get Bhutto and the massive collateral damage makes it far from a success: President Gen. Pervez Musharraf labeled the attack part of a "conspiracy against democracy," reaching out to the former prime minister with whom he is trying to forge a pro-U.S., anti-militant alliance. The "signature at the blast site and the modus operandi" suggested the involvement of militants linked to warlord Baitullah Mehsud and al-Qaida, said Ghulam Muhammad Mohtarem, the head security official in the province where Mehsud is based. "We were already fearing a strike from Mehsud and his local affiliates and this were conveyed to the (Bhutto's Pakistan's) People's Party but they got carried away by political exigencies instead of...
October 24, 2007
The Pakistani Army has deployed 2500 troops to the Swat region specificially to engage a Taliban leader and his followers. Maulana Fazlullah conducts radio broadcasts from the Swat valley to organize resistance to the Pakistani government on behalf of the Taliban in an area that had been a popular tourist region until the rise of "militancy": "The deployment may cause inconvenience to local population, but it is necessary to restore law and order in Swat," the caretaker Chief Minister of North West Frontier Province (NWFP), Shamsul Mulk, told the BBC. The army says that the soldiers deployed on Tuesday were setting up checkpoints across Swat, a valley popular with tourists until an upsurge of violence earlier this year. It says that it wants to curb the activities of militant leader Maulana Fazlullah, who reportedly has used radio broadcasts to call for jihad, or holy war, against the Pakistani authorities. Maj...
October 26, 2007
Two days ago, Pakistan positioned its army around the Swat stronghold of Taliban activist Maulana Fazlullah. Fazlullah gained the attention of Pervez Musharraf by calling for a jihad against the Pakistani government, and apparently gave Fazlullah the opportunity to fight one. Fazlullah has apparently declined, and instead ran away from Swat: Troops have surrounded and attacked a stronghold of a leading militant in the district of Swat in northern Pakistan, local police say. The pro-Taleban militant, Maulana Fazlullah, said earlier this week that he was leaving the area. ... He said on Wednesday that he was moving to another district, Kohistan. "The security forces attacked a building where Maulana Fazlullah had been appearing in recent days to urge his followers to target the Pakistan army, police and other security forces," a police official in the main town of Swat, Mingora, said, the Associated Press news agency reports. Profiles in Courage,...
November 3, 2007
Pervez Musharraf has declared a state of emergency in Pakistan, apparently not content to wait for the Supreme Court decision on his presidential election victory last month. So far, he has given no reason for the declaration, although the military activity in Swat and Waziristan is presumably the basis: President Gen. Pervez Musharraf declared a state of emergency in Pakistan on Saturday, state TV said, ahead of a crucial Supreme Court decision on whether to overturn his recent election win. The report gave no reason for the emergency but it follows weeks of speculation that the president — who is also chief of the army — could take the step, amid rising political turmoil and Islamic militant violence. "The chief of army staff has proclaimed a state of emergency and issued a provisional constitutional order," a newscaster on Pakistan TV said. Musharraf had awaited a decision from the Supreme Court...
November 4, 2007
Pervez Musharraf's seizure of power yesterday did not extend as far as feared, but instead falls in a legal gray area. The assemblies continue to operate and the status of press freedom remains unchanged, according to the Guardian's Ali Eteraz. However, Musharraf appears to have taken a page from Shakespeare's Henry VI, and rounded up all the lawyers: Traditionally, a PCO [Provisional Constitutional Order] is an order which suspends the constitution and dissolves all fundamental rights as well as legislation and judiciary, installing martial law. Except that Musharraf's PCO only dissolves the judiciary (for overstepping its limits and interfering with the war on terror) while leaving the Assembly intact. The limited scope of the PCO means the current situation is something less than martial law. Yet it cannot rightly be called an emergency either, because that does not involve a PCO. This in-between situation is being called "emergency plus". ......
November 5, 2007
The debacle continues in Pakistan, as police beat and arrested lawyers protesting the emergency rule of Pervez Musharraf in Islamabad today. The Islamist party leader Liaqat Baloch estimates that 500 members have been imprisoned, a fate he narrowly avoided by fleeing Lahore: Legions of police firing tear gas and swinging batons clashed with lawyers Monday as security forces across Pakistan blockaded courts to quash protests against President Gen. Pervez Musharraf's declaration of a state of emergency. At least 350 were detained. In the biggest gathering, about 2,000 lawyers congregated at the High Court in the eastern city of Lahore. As lawyers tried to exit onto a main road to stage a rally in defiance of a police warnings not to violate a ban on demonstrations hundreds of officers stormed inside. Police swung batons and fired tear gas shells to disperse the lawyers, who responded by throwing stones and beating police...
November 6, 2007
The political instability in Pakistan may get more intense by the end of the week, according to Der Spiegel. If Benazir Bhutto proceeds with her plans to join the lawyers and judges in the streets to protest against Pervez Musharraf's declaration of emergency, she could push the military dictator and erstwhile president into either expanding the emergency or getting toppled from power in a countercoup: With leaders from across the world twisting the arm of Pakistan's President Gen. Pervez Musharraf to retreat from his declaration of emergency on Saturday, the most intense pressure may be brewing from inside the country. Opposition leader Benazir Bhutto, who has so far refrained from mobilizing her supporters against Musharraf's installation of military rule, may go on the offensive later this week. Protests so far have been led by the country's lawyers, who staged marches in cities around the country on Monday and Tuesday. But...
Pervez Musharraf reached out and touched a couple of people in Congress today, Senator Joe Biden and Rep. Tom Lantos. Both men chair the Foreign Relations Committees in Congress, and both have a great deal of influence on how aid gets disbursed, and under which conditions. Preliminary word is that the conversations did not resemble the heartwarming television commercials we saw in the past for long-distance services: Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf reached out to Democratic leaders in Congress on Tuesday amid growing concerns that U.S. aid should be restricted or cut off until he restores democracy. Musharraf called Rep. Tom Lantos, D-Calif., and Sen. Joseph Biden, D-Del., chairmen of the House and Senate committees that deal with foreign relations. Biden, D-Del., said he told the Pakistani president it was critical he allow the elections in January as planned, and that he "take off his uniform" and "restore the rule of...
November 7, 2007
Alan Dershowitz argues that the debate in the Senate this week regarding waterboarding demonstrated a level of hypocrisy beyond the issue of Congress demanding that an Attorney General nominee enforce laws they refuse to write. In today's Opinion Journal, the Harvard professor notes that almost everyone would expect the executive branch to use whatever means necessary in the ticking-bomb scenario to protect innocent American lives -- and therefore Michael Mukasey answered correctly that the circumstances would dictate (under current law) whether a particular application of waterboarding violates the law. In fact, the hypothetical became reality for the Israelis, and will likely do the same for Americans: Recently, Israeli security officials confronted a ticking-bomb situation. Several days before Yom Kippur, they received credible information that a suicide bomber was planning to blow himself up in a crowded synagogue on the holiest day of the Jewish year. After a gun battle in...
Benazir Bhutto has issued an "ultimatum", in the wording of the BBC, warning Pervez Musharraf that she plans to demonstrate on Friday against his rule by emergency decree. Telling Pakistanis that "We are under attack," Bhutto hopes to generate a large enough protest to get Musharraf to reverse the decree and restore democracy -- but perhaps not large enough to dislodge him entirely: Attorneys' attempts to demonstrate have been repeatedly put down with police force. However, a violent clash with Bhutto's supporters would dramatically escalate the political crisis engulfing a country that is also battling rising Islamic militancy. "We denounce the government ban, and want to make it clear that our supporters and leaders will reach Rawalpindi for the rally," Babar Awan, a senior member of her Pakistan People's Party, told The Associated Press. .... Bhutto said Tuesday that Musharraf's resort to authoritarian measures was a "breach of trust" with...
George Bush told the media today that he gave Pervez Musharraf some friendly but firm advice -- settle on one career, and do it fast. Bush told Musharraf that he had to resign as army chief of staff and stay on schedule for parliamentary elections, but he did not say whether he insisted on restoring the judiciary and legal communities in Pakistan. So far, Congress does not appear impressed: President Bush told Pakistan's president on Wednesday that he must hold parliamentary elections and step down as army leader. "You can't be the president and the head of the military at the same time," Bush said, describing a telephone call with Gen. Pervez Musharraf. "I had a very frank discussion with him." Bush revealed the call to Musharraf during an appearance with the French president, Nicolas Sarkozy, at George Washington's home in Mount Vernon, Va. Sarkozy issued a statement supporting Bush's...
November 8, 2007
Pervez Musharraf responded to pressure from the US by formally setting a new election date for parliamentary elections, signaling a short run for his emergency rule. This ends a great deal of confusing and contradictory statements by his ministers, who had alternately assured people that the elections would be held as scheduled and called into question whether they could be held at all in the present political climate. That climate worsened overnight as Musharraf began rounding up supporters of Benazir Bhutto: Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf has decided that parliamentary elections will be held by February 15 and reiterated plans to step down as head of the Army, partial concessions to the pressure building on him from Washington and inside Pakistan since he declared a state of emergency over the weekend. However the embattled president still seemed headed for direct confrontation with former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto, who said today's announcements...
November 9, 2007
Benazir Bhutto had threatened to lead a rally against the emergency rule of Pervez Musharraf today, possibly sending hundreds of thousands of Pakistanis into the street in protest. Some had questioned whether the Army would obey orders to disperse such a large crowd as easily as they had with just a few hundred lawyers and their supporters, or whether the military might mutiny and send the country into chaos. Musharraf made sure we never found out: Security officials barricaded former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto inside her home behind barbed wire, concrete blocks and armored cars on Friday morning, and turned out in force in the nearby town of Rawalpindi to quash a planned rally, dispersing protesters as they tried to assemble. With conflict between Bhutto and Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf at a pitch, police early Friday began surrounding Bhutto's home, under orders to prevent her from leaving to lead the...
November 12, 2007
That explanation came from Pervez Musharraf, who told a gathering of foreign journalists that his emergency decree intended to save democracy from itself. He also announced that parliamentary elections would likely take place in January as previously scheduled and not delayed until February. However, he also would not commit to lifting the PCO suspension of the constitution, which means the elections will almost certainly be held while Musharraf governs as a dictator: Pakistan's president, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, announced Sunday that he wanted parliamentary elections to be held by early January but did not set a date for ending emergency rule, making it likely that any elections will take place with the constitution suspended and most civil liberties banned. Musharraf, wearing a grim expression and a dark blue business suit, told foreign journalists that he had declared a state of emergency Nov. 3 "to save the democratic process" from a paralyzing...
November 13, 2007
Pretty soon, we will need scorecards to keep up with the shifting alliances in Pakistan. As Pervez Musharraf slapped Benazir Bhutto with a week-long house detention to keep her from attending rallies, the former Prime Minister demanded that Musharraf step down from all offices. Bhutto also publicly suggested an alliance between her faction and that of Islamist Nawaz Sharif, a scenario guaranteed to send jitters through Washington: Former premier Benazir Bhutto urged Pakistan's Pervez Musharraf to quit as president Tuesday as she sought to form a united front with other opposition leaders against the military ruler. In her most direct challenge yet to Musharraf since he declared emergency rule, Bhutto said he was a failed leader whose time was up and vowed never to serve under him in government. ... From inside the house she moved to forge a coalition of opposition parties in an apparent bid to isolate Musharraf...
November 14, 2007
Benazir Bhutto attacks Pervez Musharraf in today's Washington Post as a man afraid to confront Islamists but all too eager to oppose democrats. The former Prime Minister calls Musharraf a dictator who had the opportunity to side with freedom and democracy, but instead remained consistent with his past actions and clung to power for his own personal reasons. If the West wants a fight against al-Qaeda and the Taliban, Bhutto warns that they have backed the wrong horse: Musharraf knows how to crack down against pro-democracy forces. He is, however, unwilling or unable to track down and arrest Osama bin Laden or contain the extremists. This is the reality of Pakistan in November 2007. The only terror that Musharraf's regime seems able to confront is the terror of his own illegitimacy. This is the second time Musharraf has imposed martial law and the second time he has sacked judges since...
November 15, 2007
Pervez Musharraf attempted to calm the chaos in Pakistan today. He announced his resignation as Army chief of staff, making himself a civilian president, by the end of November. He also began work on a caretaker government, according to US diplomatic sources: President Gen. Pervez Musharraf and his aides worked to finalize a caretaker government Thursday, while his two opposition rivals opened talks on forming an alliance against him. A U.S. diplomat was allowed to cross the barricades and heavy police cordon surrounding the house in the eastern city of Lahore where opposition leader Benazir Bhutto has been confined since Tuesday. Bryan Hunt, the U.S. consul general in Lahore, emerged an hour later and said he had told Bhutto of Washington's wish for Musharraf to lift the emergency, quit as army chief and free opposition politicians and the media. ... In an Associated Press interview Wednesday, Musharraf said he expects...
November 17, 2007
Buried in a report about John Negroponte's visit with Pervez Musharraf in Islamabad is a development that may signal some turbulence for Musharraf in the days and weeks ahead. While Musharraf shrugged off the American envoy's insistence that Musharraf end emergency rule and resign as Army Chief of Staff, he may find the same call from his own party harder to ignore: Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf told a top US diplomat Saturday that he would only call off emergency rule when the security situation improves, a senior presidential aide told AFP. Musharraf met John Negroponte, number two in the US State Department, for two hours of talks which diplomats had said the US official would use to send "a very strong message" to end the two-week-old state of emergency. ... Mushahid Hussain, secretary general of the Pakistan Muslim League-Q, told Dawn television it would be "appropriate and internationally welcomed" for...
November 19, 2007
To no one's great surprise, the reconstituted Pakistani Supreme Court has approved the election of Pervez Musharraf to the civilian presidency. The approval will allow Musharraf to resign as promised as army chief of staff while retaining executive authority. It may also open a path to a negotiated end to emergency rule, even though few put any credibility in the court: A Supreme Court hand-picked by President Gen. Pervez Musharraf swiftly dismissed legal challenges to his continued rule on Monday, opening the way for him to serve another five-year term — this time solely as a civilian president. The opposition has denounced the new court, saying any decisions by a tribunal stripped of independent voices had no credibility. Musharraf purged the court Nov. 3 when he declared emergency rule, days before the tribunal was expected to rule on his eligibility to serve as president. ... Monday's court ruling could hasten...
Continue reading "No Shocker: Court Approves Musharraf Election" »
November 20, 2007
Pervez Musharraf appears to have changed course, two days after George Bush sent a heavy-duty envoy to demand an end to emergency rule. He has released most of the political dissidents he arrested over the past few days, and the rest may be released as soon as tomorrow: President Gen. Pervez Musharraf freed thousands of opponents from jails Tuesday in a sign he is rolling back a wave of repression under emergency rule and flew to Saudi Arabia to talk about the future of an exiled rival, Nawaz Sharif. Saudi officials said there were efforts to arrange a meeting between Musharraf and Sharif, who was ousted as prime minister by the general's 1999 coup. However, a Pakistani official said Musharraf's goal was to prevent Sharif from returning before parliamentary elections Jan. 8. Back home, the political cauldron continued to boil, with dozens of journalists detained for several hours after clashing...
November 21, 2007
After a unanimous call to boycott the upcoming Pakistani parliamentary elections, opposition parties have suddenly shifted course and hinted that they will participate after all. The change in tone followed the release of most, although not all, protestors, lawyers, and opposition party officials. Even the party of still-exiled Nawaz Sharif said that a boycott made no sense unless all parties rejected the poll: Opposition parties wavered Wednesday on whether to boycott crucial Pakistani elections, backing off their most strident calls to shun the vote unless President Gen. Pervez Musharraf ends his state of emergency. The government continued to roll back a wave of repression, freeing several hundred more opponents across the country, as the president returned from a trip to Saudi Arabia to discuss the future of an exiled rival, Nawaz Sharif. ... Bhutto said late Tuesday that it would be a "good sign" if Musharraf quits his army post,...
November 24, 2007
Former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif will return to Pakistan today as radical Islamists killed 35 people in two suicide attacks on military installations. Pervez Musharraf has apparently changed his mind about keeping Sharif in exile after meeting with Saudi leaders last week. Sharif adds more uncertainty about the direction of Pakistani politics in a month of roller-coaster changes: Pakistan's military ruler General Pervez Musharraf will allow his bitter rival Nawaz Sharif to return home tomorrow, ending seven years of exile in Saudi Arabia, Musharraf's spokesman said. "Yes he will be allowed to land," retired General Rashid Qureshi told the Observer, referring to Sharif's planned arrival at Lahore airport this afternoon aboard a chartered Saudi jet. Musharraf ejected Sharif, whom he deposed as prime minister in a 1999 coup, from Pakistan when he tried to return last September. Four hours after landing in Islamabad the burly politician was bundled onto a...
November 25, 2007
The return of Nawaz Sharif to Pakistan went better than his last visit, where security forces bundled him onto a plane within hours of his arrival. This time, the former Prime Minister left the airport and successfully transited to his home, as planned in Saudi Arabia this week. While Sharif still opposes Musharraf, he has apparently accepted the presidential election as a fait accompli: Speaking to the BBC from inside his plane, Mr Sharif said there was little room for any understanding with Mr Musharraf. He said his objectives were to rid the country of military rule and to strengthen democracy. ... BBC Pakistan correspondent Barbara Plett says Mr Sharif remains opposed to Gen Musharraf, but that he no longer poses a direct threat because the military leader has recently secured another presidential term by declaring an emergency. His return on Sunday would be in time to file nomination papers...
The Pakistani military has committed ground troops to Swat, where a Taliban insurgency had taken control of the first settled area. The army says it has severed enemy lines of communication and killed over 200 militants, and wrested control of mountaintops from the forces loyal to Maulana Fazlullah. If so, it represents the first major military action since Pervez Musharraf declared emergency rule in part to fight the radical Islamists: Pakistani troops have begun a major ground offensive against pro-Taleban militants in a former tourist resort in the North West Frontier province. Military officials say more than 200 militants have been killed in the past week, but there is no independent confirmation of those figures. A curfew has been imposed in the area around the Swat Valley, about 160km (100 miles) from Islamabad. Thousands of civilians are reported to have fled from the fighting. We've heard before that the army...
November 26, 2007
Opposition figures Benazir Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif have thus far played coy about participating in the January 8th parliamentary elections. Although Bhutto told supporters she would decide on the elections last week, she has kept her options open. Sharif didn't rule out running for Parliament either, although his party had earlier called for boycotts. Both have now signaled willingness to participate by registering as candidates: Pakistan's former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif has filed nomination papers for the country's general elections, but insists he may boycott the poll. Mr Sharif says he will not stand for election unless President Pervez Musharraf lifts the state of emergency. Benazir Bhutto has now filed papers for three parliamentary seats. There are signs that Gen Musharraf will step down as head of the army and be sworn in for another term as president this week. The next move rests with Musharraf. If he does not...
November 27, 2007
For those playing the will-he-or-won't-he game with Pervez Musharraf, the first position seems to be the winner. The newly-elected president of Pakistan has made his farewell inspection of the troops, in apparent preparation for his resignation as Army chief of staff tomorrow. He gave no indication whether the emergency order would end at the same time as his military commission: Pervez Musharraf visited troops Tuesday to bid them farewell, a day before he planned to stand down as military chief to become a civilian head of state in a move aimed at easing the country's political crisis. A guard of honor composed of service personnel from the army, navy and air force greeted him as he arrived at armed forces headquarters in Rawalpindi, a garrison city near the capital Islamabad. Musharraf, who wore his general's uniform, did not make any comments to journalists who were being taken on a military-conducted...
November 28, 2007
Pervez Musharraf has finally fulfilled his promise to resign from the military and rule as a civilian. More than three years after pledging to retire as Army chief of staff, and weeks after his gambit to run for the civilian post as an active-duty general, Musharraf finally bid his comrades farewell in an emotional valediction. At least one of his political opponents stated that it made "a lot of difference": President Pervez Musharraf stepped down Wednesday from his powerful post as Pakistan's military commander, a day before he was to be sworn in as a civilian president in a long-delayed pledge not to hold both jobs. During a change of command, Musharraf relinquished his post by handing over his ceremonial baton to his hand-picked successor, Gen. Ashfaq Kayani. "(You) are the saviors of Pakistan," Musharraf said in an emotional final speech to the troops. He appeared to be blinking back...
Pakistan's Attorney General tells the Daily Times that the parliamentary elections will not be held under emergency rule, and that the newly-civilian president may lift his emergency decree within days. If so, this represents an amazing reversal for Pervez Musharraf, who had given every indication that the PCO would continue for at least the next several weeks (via the Weekly Standard): Attorney General (AG) of Pakistan Malik Muhammad Qayyum said on Tuesday that the Provisional Constitution Order (PCO) would be lifted “very soon”. “It is for sure the elections will be held under the constitution and not the PCO,” he told Daily Times. He said when the Presidential election was held the constitution was fully operative and General Musharraf was re-elected for another term as a constitutional president. When asked if he could suggest a time frame for the lifting of emergency rule and revocation of the PCO, he said...
November 29, 2007
How long does it take to get to the end of a political emergency? Longer than it takes to get to the center of a Tootsie Pop, but shorter than it takes to get to the next election, at least in Pakistan. Pervez Musharraf now says he expects to cancel the PCO that sent his nation into a paroxysm of unrest by December 16th, the first time that he has given an end date for the state of emergency: Musharraf's decision to end emergency rule by Dec. 16, revealed in a television address to the nation, came the same day he was sworn in as a civilian for his second five-year term as president. He resigned as army chief on Wednesday. Seeking to end months of political crisis, Musharraf urged Pakistan's leading opposition figures — former prime ministers Sharif and Benazir Bhutto — to participate in the Jan. 8 parliamentary...