Pakistan After Musharraf: Same As It Ever Was, Only A Bit More So; Kinda Like What We Have Here, But Different

Celebrations were widespread and general in the wake of Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf's resignation -- but they were cut short by a bomb and a bombshell.

The joy which made the Pakistanis dance -- the thrill of finally seeing the back of a former military dictator -- was not confined, as the AP would slyly have us believe, to Islamist militants, or even Islamic fundamentalists.

As you can see in these photos (courtesy of Reuters), opposition to Musharraf ran much deeper and broader than that.

Crucially, the pro-democracy (read: anti-Musharraf) movement in Pakistan has been led by the country's lawyers (the men in black suits in these photos), strongly supported by the Pakistani journalists. (Those looking to "compare and contrast" Pakistan and the USA could find worse places to start.)

Compare And Contrast

Curiously, according to Ray McGovern, much of the big American media managed to report Musharraf's resignation without mentioning that he was under severe threat of impeachment.

McGovern provides excellent and relevant context pertaining to the threat of impeachment leveled against Richard Nixon in 1974, the collapse and rapid resignation which followed, and the surge of support enjoyed by the Democratic party in the wake of that resignation -- all this in an article which fairly begs the Democrats in Congress to get some impeachment proceedings happening here and now.

But he's shouting into a black hole, I fear. Congress has no illusions about what would happen in America if impeachment proceedings were initiated against the most despicable human being ever to defile the Oval Office, and that's exactly why Nancy Pelosi and John Conyers and all the others are sitting on their hands.

They've enabled this long torturous march to bankruptcy and tyranny. Do we now expect them to turn against the success they've labored so long and hard to achieve? We might expect it, but it's not going to happen. So why do we have these expectations?

It's like watching a schoolyard bully beat up one little kid after another, then turning to the guy holding the bully's coat and saying, "Hey, aren't you gonna do something about this?"

No one but a fool would be astonished if the guy holding the coat replied, "I'm doin' it right now, sucka!"

It leaves a bad taste in my mouth when I see that, and I see it a lot.

You can't appeal to their conscience because they have none.

You can't appeal to their better judgment because it's not a mistake; it's a deliberate policy. We've seen it over and over and over; the only difference is that they're getting a little bit more subtle about it.

And you can never hope to deal with the problem until and unless you see it clearly and spell it out in short words, so:

The Democrats aren't just holding the coat; they're planning to wear it next.

The Bomb

Meanwhile, back in Pakistan:

The celebration was short-lived for some; more than 20 people were killed and at least another 30 were injured in an alleged suicide bombing of a hospital.

The bombing was reported in the big American media in the same context-free style that was so prominently displayed in the "coverage" of Musharraf's resignation.

Jane Perlez of the New York Times reported it this way:

In an attack claimed by the Taliban within the tribal region on Tuesday, a suicide bomber ripped into the emergency room of the district hospital in Dera Ismail Khan, a town near Waziristan, killing 25 people and injuring 30, said the inspector general of the police in the North-West Frontier Province, Malik Naveed Khan. He said there was some evidence that the suicide bomber was linked to Waziristan, the base of the leader of the Pakistani Taliban, Baitullah Mehsud.

Pay close attention to this report, if you please. Your eyes will want to glance over it quickly, and understandably so. You've seen this report before, many times. It's the standard, boilerplate, terrorist attack report, in which only the names and dates are changed.

The common features are always common: in particular, there's always a suspect; but there's never a motive.

If you care to dig a bit, you can find evidence of a motive behind this particular attack; but you won't find such evidence in the formerly so-called paper of record (because according to the official story told to Americans, terrorists don't have motives).

So you'll have to go to a more reliable source, such as the Pakistani daily, Dawn, which first reported (courtesy of Reuters):

A bomb went off in the compound of a hospital in northwest Pakistan’s Dera Ismail Khan town Tuesday killing 20 people, a senior government official said.

“We don't know whether it was a suicide attack but the bomb went off in the compound. I have initial reports of 20 dead,” said Syed Mohsin Shah, a senior city government official.

Supporters of a Shi'ite Muslim leader were protesting outside the hospital when the bomb went off.

The leader was shot dead earlier Tuesday and his body taken to the hospital.

... and later (courtesy of AFP) added a few more details:

A suicide bomber blew himself up Tuesday at a hospital in the northwestern Dera Ismail Khan town, killing at least 23 people, police said.

The explosion happened as people gathered to protest over the death of a man in a suspected sectarian attack in the town, said provincial police chief Malik Naveed Khan.

“There are 23 confirmed dead and up to 20 wounded. We have found the legs of the suspected suicide bomber,” Khan told a private television channel.

Provincial police spokesman Riaz Ahmed said the dead included civilians from the crowd of protesters and policemen who went to the hospital to provide security.

Is the New York Times unable to find out such details? I didn't have any trouble doing it, and the NYT has a large professional staff. So it can't be any harder for them than it was for me. But they don't want these details, because these details don't fit into the story the NYT is telling. And changing the story would be a lot more difficult than omitting a few details.

But if there's a story they want to tell, no stretch is too big.

So Jane Perlez can tell us that a policeman said

... there was some evidence that the suicide bomber was linked to Waziristan, the base of the leader of the Pakistani Taliban, Baitullah Mehsud ...

In this case, as usual, the connection to the preferred suspect is tenuous at best. It's not as if Waziristan were a hotel, and Baitullah Mehsud owned it. Waziristan is a huge area; how "some evidence" could link a crime to such a large region, and therefore to a single man, is puzzling at best.

But not for long. The seemingly gratuitous mention of Baitullah Mehsud is both telling and opportune, since it gives me the chance to remind you that Baitullah Mehsud is almost certainly a CIA asset.

If I also remind you that analysts predict increased American pressure against Pakistan now that their main ally in the region is gone, you might put two and two together and wonder whether the pressure has already been stepped up. KA-BOOM! HaHaHA!

The Bombshell

The post-resignation joy was short-lived in another, very different way: the governing coalition has suddenly run aground on the rocky coast of irreconcilable differences.

The show-stopping rift between the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP), led by Asif Ali Zardari, and the PML-N, Nawaz Sharif's faction of the Pakistan Muslim League, concerns the status of the Supreme Court in the wake of Musharraf's November declaration of emergency.

The reason for Musharraf's declaration -- and the reason for all the other unconstitutional and anti-democratic moves which followed it -- was obvious: the country had been gripped by a popular pro-democracy movement, and the Supreme Court, led by the indomitable Chief Justice, Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry, was about to rule Musharraf's October "re-election" illegal.

So Musharraf declared a national emergency, clamped down on the media, arrested hundreds of political opposition leaders, and sacked all the federal justices -- including those on the Supreme Court -- who didn't support him in this transparently illicit attempt to retain power.

Musharraf eventually lifted the state of emergency but he didn't reinstate the court. The chief justice remained under house arrest. And elections were scheduled under these conditions.

So the PML-N campaigned -- and did quite well -- on a pledge to reinstate the judges who were sacked by Musharraf.

But the PPP -- which ran on deception and public sympathy and promised nothing, but gained even more seats in the parliament -- won't support them on this point.

It's a no-brainer -- or at least it would be if the PPP wanted to establish anything resembling legitimate democracy. But that's not what the PPP is about -- not anymore!

Down Memory Lane, Quickly

Readers with functional long-term memories may recall that former PPP leader Benazir Bhutto returned to Pakistan last fall after spending nearly a decade in ritzy foreign hotels as a fugitive from justice (which the Western media complicitly called "self-imposed exile").

Her return was made possible by an American-brokered "reconciliation" deal which removed any possibility that she might be held accountable for two terms of epic corruption as Prime Minister. In return for this immunity, she promised to support Musharraf's continued illegal tenure as president.

Shortly after Benzair Bhutto returned to Pakistan, she was assassinated, as most of us remember. But most of us don't know that high-level American officials didn't expect her to live long there, as John F. Burns reported in the New York Times:

[B]efore the Western world passes judgment, many Pakistanis would say, it might well look at its own manipulations, including the role the United States played in placing Ms. Bhutto on the path that led to that last rally in Rawalpindi.

For months, Washington had brokered contacts between General Musharraf and Ms. Bhutto that aimed at having her return, win an election, and lend a democratic facade to a government that would remain, in important ways, under military control. The plan matched American imperatives in the struggle against Al Qaeda, and American officials who pushed for it saw little problem in encouraging General Musharraf to grant an amnesty for Ms. Bhutto against corruption charges stemming from her time as prime minister.

But the Americans knew that she went home at enormous risk. When she spoke in Aspen at a lunch of prominent American political, business and media leaders only weeks before her death, talk at one table turned to the chances of an assassination. “I’d say she’s a dead woman walking,” this reporter, long an acquaintance of Ms. Bhutto, said after talking to her about the hazards of going home. “Yes,” a powerful Washington insider with close links to the administration replied. “We think so, too.”

But that was the plan ... and this was the result: Shortly after her death there was a long and fractious meeting of the PPP leadership. At that meeting, Bhutto's widower, Asif Ali Zardari, produced what's been called a "surprise will" -- a document supposedly written by [or on behalf of] Benazir Bhutto, recommending turning leadership of the party over to a teenager -- Bhutto's and Zardari's son, Bilawal Zardari.

Nobody else had ever seen this "will", and its directions were mystifying in more than one respect. Most importantly, PPP leadership had always been in the Bhutto family.

Indeed, much of the history of Pakistan since partition can be seen as a struggle between democracy and militarism, waged between the Bhutto family and their followers on one side, and the Pakistani Army and its supporters (later joined by the notorious Inter-Service Intelligence Agency, or ISI) on the other.

But through the joint miracles of political assassination and gluttonous corruption, the PPP had been transformed from a pro-democratic, anti-militaristic political force (led by Benazir's predecessors) to a pro-militaristic, anti-democratic parasite (led by Benazir herself).

Thanks to propaganda, poor communications, political tribalism and actual tribalism, the PPP has retained popular support despite the fact that it's been under corrupt "new management" for most of the past 20 years. How slowly we learn!

At 19 years of age, Bilawal Zardari was hardly fit to lead any political party, let alone the PPP. But one after another, the obstacles were lifted: POOF! He got a new name, and now he's Bilawal Bhutto Zardari. Then POOF! His father offered to "lead" the party while Bilawal continued his education. And now Asif Ali Zardari is the American sock-puppet in Islamabad. But nobody knows it, unless they read between the lines.

The lines have been clear for a long time, though. Nawaz Sharif and the PML-N have been pushing for reinstatement of the judiciary, especially Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry, while the usurper Zardari and the PPP have been pretending that they might move in that direction at some future time under some future conditions, when there's no danger of a backlash from Musharraf ... but not now ... never now ... always later, always maybe, but never now.

No Excuses Remain For The Criminal Zardari

With Musharraf gone, there's no chance of a backlash, and Zardari has no plausible reason to resist a return of the pre-emergency judiciary ... but he still won't do it.

And Nawaz Sharif has had enough.

Therefore, Jane Perlez reports:

Nawaz Sharif, the leader of [...] the Pakistan Muslim League-N, walked out of a meeting [in Islamabad] and headed back to his home in Lahore, a four-hour drive away.

Party members said Mr. Sharif had delivered an ultimatum to the senior coalition party, the Pakistan Peoples Party, led by Asif Ali Zardari, to consent to the return of the chief justice, Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry, within 72 hours, or [...] Mr. Sharif’s party would leave the government. Mr. Chaudhry was among some 60 judges suspended by Mr. Musharraf last year.

Even by the standards of Pakistan’s hard-boiled and volatile political scene, the public discord between the political leaders was surprising, politicians said, a sign that opposition to Mr. Musharraf may have been the strongest thread tying them together.

Notice the spin technique. Far from being the glue that held PPP and PML-N together, Musharraf had been providing an excuse for Zardari. But now the excuse is exposed as hollow, and Sharif isn't waiting around to see any more of that movie.

Why won't Zardari support the restoration of an independent judiciary?

Jane Perlez reports that Musharraf made a second "reconciliation" agreement to let Zardari into the country after his wife was slain:

The basis of Mr. Zardari’s opposition to Mr. Chaudhry rests with a fear that he might undo an amnesty agreement that absolved Mr. Zardari of corruption charges, lawyers said. The amnesty, which applies to bureaucrats and politicians who faced corruption charges, was part of a package arranged by Mr. Musharraf when Mr. Zardari returned to Pakistan after his wife, the former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto, was assassinated late last year.

So Zardari is thoroughly compromised -- just like the Democrats!

Same As It Ever Was

Which leaves us where? More or less where we were last week -- or last month -- or last year -- but a bit poorer and a bit dirtier, lacking sleep and food and vision, as always, but a bit more so now than ever. In other words, it could be worse and it probably will be, soon. But not in the way you think.

Musharraf is gone but the vaunted threat of Pakistani nuclear weapons getting into the hands of Pakistani terrorists is still as slim as it ever was ... for at least two reasons.

One of those reasons is public knowledge: Musharraf wasn't in control of the weapons in the first place. According to the AP (via Dawn), Pakistan's nuclear weapons are guarded by a committee, and Musharraf wasn't on the committee.

“Pakistan's nuclear assets are not one man's property,” said Maria Sultan, a defense analyst and director at the London-based South Asian Strategic Stability Institute.

“Any (political) transition in Pakistan will have no effect on Pakistan's nuclear assets because it has a very strong custodial control.”

The committee, known as the National Command and Control Authority [NCCA], is served by a military-dominated organization with thousands of security forces and intelligence agents whose personnel are closely screened.

The nuclear facilities are tightly guarded.
...

“Pakistan's nuclear arsenal is in the hands of the army and the army is not changing hands, so whatever the situation was before is largely what it will continue to be,” said Teresita Schaffer, director of the South Asia Program at the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies.

Left out of this report but sometimes mentioned elsewhere is the fact that the NCCA is very pro-western (which means, pro-USA). We don't worry too much about them, in other words, because they're "our guys".

The second reason is not publicly acknowledged, but it's becoming increasingly clear: the terrorists are "our guys", too.

Overdue Conclusion

It's time to draw another long post to an overdue conclusion. So let's review some of the things I would have mentioned, had I thought of them earlier.

The struggle in Pakistan has typically been falsely portrayed as a battle of moderates against extremists. In this scenario, the moderates are Musharraf and Bush and their friends in the so-called "Global War On Terror". And the extremists are al Qaeda, the Taliban, and Islamic fundamentalism in general, plus anyone who wanted to get rid of Musharraf.

In fact the struggle is between moderates and extremists, but the extremists are Musharraf and Bush and their allegedly "former" friends in al Qaeda and the Taliban, plus a very tiny (and shrinking) minority which supports radical Islamic extremism.

Meanwhile, the moderates include those who support the PML-N, plus those who support the PPP for historical reasons, plus many other Pakistanis who support other moderate parties, plus a great many other Pakistanis who don't support any political party. And that's just Pakistan. There are millions of moderates and a handful of extremists in every country, of course.

The bottom line: the PPP are still in control in Pakistan -- though perhaps not by much. The PPP are pro-American, which means (among other things) that they don't support the rule of law, but they do support the military. This was Musharraf's position, this was Benazir Bhutto's position, and it comes as no surprise that it's also Asif Ali Zardari's position.

As for American policy towards Pakistan, it's quite simple, and it's very similar to American policy towards Iraq.

All the Bush administration wants to see in Pakistan is a legitimate, democratically elected government that's fully supportive of American interests.

It's impossible, of course. There's no way any government fully supportive of "American interests" could be legitimately elected in Pakistan, or anywhere else in Asia, or anywhere else in Europe ... or anywhere at all, actually.

So let's consider the alternatives, from a policy-maker's point of view. The options are stark! And the choice is a no-brainer.

The American policy elite has always preferred governments "supportive of American interests" rather than "legitimate, democratically elected" governments ... but at the same time we're talking about two deliberate lies here.

First, the considerations collectively referred to as "American interests" are, for the most part, arrangements established and maintained by stealth or coercion or overt mass murder; arrangements which grant multi-national corporations virtually unimpeded "rights" to exploit the natural and human resources of the "host" countries ... as many "host" countries as possible. It has nothing whatsoever to do with "American interests", but if they call it what it really is, will we go to war on their behalf?

Second, the American policy elite has no interest in fostering "legitimate, democratically elected" governments anywhere in the world; they just say that because they know we like to hear it -- and some of us like to hear it so much that we go marching off to war whenever they say it. But it's only a slogan.

In fact, there's nothing the American policy elite fears more than "legitimate, democratically elected" governments.

That's why all their "attempts" to "export democracy" to other parts of the world have "failed".

That's why democratically elected governments all over the world find themselves looking down the barrel of an American gun as soon as they take office.

And that's why we don't have a democracy here, either.

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Mass Resignations: Pakistani Cabinet Split Over Rule Of Law

In Pakistan, the opposition party PML-N, led by former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif [photo], has resigned its seats in the cabinet. This dramatic move shows enormous strain in the "coalition" government elected in February of this year.

The "coalition" is led by the PPP, which was led by Benazir Bhutto until her assassination last December, and which is now effectively in the hands of her widow, Asif Ali Zardari, although it is nominally led by their teenaged son, Bilawal "Bhutto" Zardari, who is currently in England seeking an undergrad degree.

At issue is the status of the Pakistani judiciary; Sharif and the PML-N have consistently stated that their top priority is the reinstatement of all the judges sacked by President Pervez Musharraf when he declared a state of emergency in November.

Asif Zardari and the PPP have talked about re-establishing an independent judiciary but they have thrown one roadblock after another in the way of their proclaimed goal, and in this respect their actions have spoken much louder than their words. In my view, it was only a matter of time before Nawaz Sharif -- who has seemed to see through this charade ever since it began -- obtained enough political support to make this break with the so-called "coalition".

The PML-N have not resigned their seats in parliament, so the government remains in power, although with nine of 24 cabinet positions vacant (including Finance), it doesn't seem as though the government will be able to function much, or at all. In short, the situation is very unstable at the moment.

The problem, from Zardari's point of view, is that a reinstatement of the sacked judges would put the Supreme Court back the way it was prior to the declaration of emergency: in particular, Iftikhar Muhammed Chaudhry would once again be Chief Justice. And Chaudhry, as Jane Perlez of the New York Times puts it, is a "maverick".

Perlez describes Chaudhry as a "country judge from Baluchistan" whose independence threatens the policies of George W. Bush and terror war "ally", Pervez Musharraf. The problem -- although Perlez does not and never will say so -- is that Bush and Musharraf are committed to the destruction of the rule of law, and Chaudhry, the maverick country lawyer from Baluchistan, is committed to upholding it.

Thus, any reinstatement of the Pakistani judiciary would put at risk not only the continuing tenure in office of President Musharraf, but also Pakistan's status as an ally of the United States in the so-called "Global War on Terror".

As long-time readers of this space may recall, President Musharraf was "re-elected" last October in a comic farce that clearly violated at least two (and maybe three) different laws.

Musharraf should not even have been eligible, since he was a General -- and Army Chief of Staff -- at the time. According to Pakistani law, one may only hold one office at a time; you cannot be both a soldier and an elected official at the same time, let alone Chief of Staff and President. For that matter, Musharraf's tenure in office has been illegal ever since he siezed power in a military coup in 1999. And the fact that he resigned his commission after his October "re-election" does nothing to satisfy the law he broke by running for office.

Furthermore, in Pakistan the President is elected by the members of the national Parliament and the provincial Legislative Assemblies. This is supposed to happen just after each new Parliament is elected; they then elect the President who will serve with them during their term in office. But for this cycle, Musharraf revised the timetable, scheduling the Presidential election for October 2007 and the Parliamentary election for January 2008, so that he could be "re-elected" by the same Parliament which had "elected" him in the first place. (The Parliamentary election scheduled for January was postponed to February following the assassination of PPP leader Benazir Bhutto.)

There's also a question of term limits. In Pakistan, as in the US, no President may serve more than two consecutive terms. Musharraf and his supporters claimed that his first term -- from when he siezed power in 1999 to when he arranged to be "elected" in 2003 -- was not a term at all, since he wasn't elected then. But those who oppose Musharraf have a different view.

The previous Parliamentary election was widely seen as rigged. And the notion that the same group of falsely elected Parliamentarians should be able to "re-elect" a military dictator to his third term as President seems exceptionally offensive to those who favor the rule of law. As I've been saying, the former Chief Justice of the Supreme Court is one of those people. Just before he was sacked, the Supreme Court announced that it was preparing to rule on petitions challenging Musharraf's "re-election". And the ruling was not likely to be favorable to the President -- this is why he declared the state of emergency and sacked the judges. So it seems quite likely that if Chaudhry were reinstated, Musharraf's presidency -- and the changes he made when declaring the emergency -- would soon be declared illegitimate.

This is not the first time Iftikhar Chaudhry has been a thorn in the sides of Bush, Musharraf and the GWOT. He was dismissed from his position amid a flurry of unsubstantiated allegations in March of 2007, after he supported the families of hundreds of people who have been "disappeared" by the Pakistani law-enforcement and intelligence agencies.

He was later reinstated after a large public show of support, but he didn't stay in office very long. "He's a threat to the GWOT," they said. And he still is.

Meanwhile, the PPP continue to play the role of faux-opposition, with Zardari apparently taking instuctions from the Americans who come to visit him every time he comes too close to supporting the rule of law or the much-ballyhooed "transition to democracy" which was supposedly represented by Musharraf's "doffing the uniform" and by Benazir Bhutto's return to the country to lead the "opposition".

In fact Buhtto's return was predicated on the proclamation of a "reconciliation order", which granted her amnsety from the corruption charges which had kept her out of Pakistan for most of the previous decade. Not wishing to show undue favoritism, the presidential order granted unconditional amnesty to many present and former government officials, effectively ending any hope of any Pakistani government official ever being held accountable for anything. Iftikhar Chaudhry might have a maverick opinion about this, as well. But we don't know much about what he thinks, because he's been under house arrest and incommunicado most of the time since November.

Meanwhile, in return for the amnesty -- and for the chance for another turn in power -- Bhutto agreed to keep the PPP in their seats last October for Musharraf's farcical "re-election". So the PPP abstained rather than resigning in protest, like the other opposition parties did.

If everyone had resigned except Musharraf's party, the PML-Q, the "re-election" would have been much more difficult to portray as "democratic". But with the most powerful opposition party on board, it was easy for the media to portray the dissenters as crackpots who just don't appreciate the wisdom of sacrificing the entire legal basis of our civilization so that a few corrupt criminal politicians can wage a bogus war without borders, killing millions of people, destroying one country after another, and making a fortune for themselves and their backers.

37 Dead As Suicide Bomber Attacks Pakistani Political Rally

More horrible violence racks Pakistan in the final days before Monday's parliamentary election, as Jane Perlez of the New York Times reports from Lahore.

A suicide bomber rammed a car into a campaign rally in the tribal areas on Saturday, killing 37 people and wounding at least 90 others.

The attack in Parachinar, a town in Kurram, occurred two days before parliamentary elections on Monday and was apparently intended to deter voters from participating, said Brig. Javed Cheema, a spokesman for the Interior Ministry.

“It’s the same people who have been carrying out attacks, whose purpose is to create confusion and chaos and stop the polling process,” Brigadier Cheema said. The government of President Pervez Musharraf has blamed a Pakistani Taliban leader, Baitullah Mehsud, who is allied with Al Qaeda, for the steep rise in suicide attacks in the past year.

It seemed unlikely, however, that the attack on Saturday would have a significant effect on voter turnout because the tribal areas, which are semiautonomous and border Afghanistan, are considered remote and lawless by most Pakistanis.

Thus Perlez points out one aspect of the Interior Ministry's announcement that seems odd, but she doesn't mention the other: The government has no proof of anyone's complicity in anything.

She goes on to describe the scene of the attack:

The rally at Parachinar was organized by Syed Riaz Hussain, a candidate for the national Parliament who is affiliated with the Pakistan Peoples Party, the opposition party of former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto, who was assassinated in December. After the rally, supporters of Mr. Hussain gathered on a roof for food, and others stayed on the roadside below in a large group, Brigadier Cheema said.

The suicide bomber, driving a car filled with explosives, attacked the group on the side of the road, the brigadier said. Kurram is known for sectarian violence between Shiite and Sunni Muslims, although Saturday’s attack was aimed at a political rally. According to one account, the people at the rally had emerged from a Shiite shrine and were on their way to the headquarters of Mr. Hussain when the bomber drove into the crowd.

Hours later, two people were killed and eight wounded in a suicide attack outside an army media center in the northwestern Swat Valley, Agence France-Presse said.

The Parachinar attack was the first violent incident in the immediate prelude to the election that pits President Musharraf’s party, the Pakistan Muslim League-Q, against two main opposition parties, the Peoples Party and the faction of the Pakistan Muslim League led by former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif.

The first violent incident in the immediate prelude to the election but not the first violent attack of the campaign and likely not the last either, sad to say.

Mr. Musharraf was re-elected late last year to a five-year term as president, but the parliamentary elections are viewed by many as a referendum on his rule, which has been marred in the last year by an increasingly aggressive insurgency of Islamists, the killing of Ms. Bhutto and the imposition of emergency rule.

It's very interesting to see what details are left out of this report.

For instance, Jane Perlez gives no indication that Musharraf's "re-election" (last October 6) was even more "marred" than his "rule" has been. As we have discussed here many times, Musharraf's "re-election" was a tragic farce, the conduct of which violated three distinct laws. The Supreme Court of Pakistan was about to strike down the "result" of that "election" when Musharraf imposed emergency rule on November 3.

Musharraf said he was going after the terrorists, but one of his first moves was to sack the Chief Justice, Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry, and the eight other justices who refused to go along with the program. Those nine judges are still under house arrest, more than three months after the emergency was declared. These facts are well known to anyone who cares to learn.

So when the Americans send observers to monitor Monday's election, they are not really interested in democracy; if democracy were the goal, the US would have cut ties with Musharraf a long time ago. He did take power in a military coup, after all.

Oh, no. What the Americans are interested in is the appearance of democracy.

Senator Joseph R. Biden Jr., the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, who will be an election observer, said Friday before leaving Washington for Pakistan that the United States should cut military aid to Pakistan if the elections were substantially rigged.

Guess what, Joe? The election last October was substantially rigged -- illegal three times over. The president could only maintain his power by arresting the Supreme Court and keeping them still and quiet, so that's what he did.

The rule of law is still suspended and the honest judges are still under house arrest and bombers are ravaging the opposition and the government keeps blaming it on "extremists".

But the fact remains that extremists are barely represented in Pakistani parliaments and have very little to lose in this election. Musharraf, whose hold on power grows increasingly tenuous, has much more to lose, should the election go ahead as scheduled and in peace. And therefore it is very difficult to dismiss the claims of those who say Musharraf and/or his security forces have been behind all this violence.

The American collaborators in this farce have said nothing about any of this; if they had any principles (other than maintenance of power) they wouldn't be sending observers at all -- they'd be denouncing the horrific Pakistani-American farce that pretends to be democracy.

Pakistan: Rallies, Strikes And Protests Planned For "Iftikhar Day"

The pro-democracy movement in Pakistan may be beaten down but they certainly haven't given up.

The nation's lawyers, who have been leading an increasingly popular movement in support of true democracy and the rule of law, have been organizing nationwide protests, strikes and rallies for Thursday, marking 90 days since the imposition of Pakistan's national state of emergency.

The emergency, announced by then-General, still-President Pervez Musharraf, was supposed to allow him to crack down on terrorists, but he used his considerably enhanced powers to crack down on legitimate political opposition, including opposition party activists, human rights activists, lawyers and judges.

Musharraf sacked all the Supreme Court justices who didn't support his "inside coup", and placed them under house arrest. The day of protest is named in honor of the suddenly-former Chief Justice, Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry, seen in happier times in this photo.

When the emergency was declared, Pakistan's Supreme Court, led by Chief Justice Chaudhry, was about to rule on the legitimacy of Musharraf's "re-election" (not to be confused with the upcoming parliamentary election).

Musharraf's "re-election" was in clear violation of two laws and arguably violated a third. The question before the Supreme Court was not one of interpreting the law, but of deciding whether to enforce it.

This is not exactly a constitutional argument in Pakistan but a cultural one, which falls under the rubric of "doctrine of necessity". In other words, some people say the security and stability of the nation can be more important than strict adherence to an arbitrary law. Others, of whom you are reading one at the moment, say the nation is more secure if its politicians are required to abide by the law.

And apparently the court had decided to rule against the still-President, then-General. We don't know for sure, because all the justices who would have made that ruling are still under house arrest.

This is not the first time Musharraf has tried to rid himself of the Chief Justice. The photo at the top of this page was taken when the previous episode -- which gave the pro-democracy movement an enormous boost -- was decided in favor of the Chief Justice. Musharraf had tried to get rid of Chaudhry on trumped-up, trivial charges that didn't stick; this time he got rid of them all for trying to uphold the rule of law.

The "emergency" has been declared "over", but the judges are still under house arrest, and the people of Pakistan -- led by their lawyers and journalists -- are getting ready to make some noise about it.

This is not a trivial matter; there's a good chance that people will get killed by "security" forces today.

Whose security? That's a very good question!

Imran Khan Gets It; Do You? Elections Without The Rule Of Law Are Meaningless

The news from Pakistan is full of feel-good stories about the return of former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, who was allowed to return Sunday after eight years of exile in Saudi Arabia without being arrested and immediately deported, as he was in September when he first tried to return.

The government arrested thousands of Sharif's supporters shortly before his return, in order to prevent the occasion from getting too joyous, and deployed hundreds of policemen to cordon off the airport and try to prevent anything joyous from happening there either.

But they were unsuccessful, as a crowd estimated at a thousand breached the cordon and greeted the returning hero at the terminal. How poignant!

Nawaz Sharif may not be able to contest the election because of a prior conviction. But who cares?

Or maybe he will be able to participate after all. Pakistani observers have been speculating that Sharif must have made a deal with Musharraf, perhaps one similar to the National Reconciliation Ordinance which granted amnesty to (some) (current and) former politicians and thus allowed Bhutto to return from Dubai last month.

Sharif and Musharraf both deny that any such deal has been made. But the Indian news service DNA has some interesting details about the nonexistent arrangement.

Others have said that Saudi King Abdullah has been calling the shots here; he has hosted Nawaz Sharif ever since Musharraf deposed the former PM in a bloodless coup in 1999. The king also provided an airplane for Nawaz Sharif's return, and has reportedly given him two bulletproof cars and offered him a helicopter for the duration of the campaign.

Musharraf traveled to Saudi Arabia last week, his first trip abroad since November 3, when the President General declared a state of emergency (supposedly because of the threat of terrorism) and imposed de facto martial law (which hasn't stopped the terrorism, as illustrated by the 35 dead from two suicide bombings in Rawalpindi).

Perhaps Musharraf's clampdown has been ineffective because it has targeted judges and lawyers and human rights advocates and political activists, rather than the suicide bombers who are supposedly Pakistan's big problem.

Prior to November 3rd, Musharraf's big problem was the obvious fact that his October 6 "re-election" was illegal -- for at least three different reasons! -- and six petitions against it had been filed with the Supreme Court, led by Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry.

The court was apparently about to rule the "election" illegal, and whether or not Musharraf had already been thinking about consolidating his power by declaring a state of emergency, this was clearly the time to do it.

So the President General went to the Supreme Court and asked the justices to support his declaration of emergency. Seven justices (including Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry) refused, and then they were all relieved of their duties and taken into custody. All seven are reportedly still under house arrest.

Sharif and his brother and his wife and Benazir Bhutto are all getting ready to file their papers for the upcoming parliamentary elections, which are scheduled for early January.

Monday is the deadline for filing and Nawaz Sharif appears to have returned at precisely the last possible moment. Fancy that!

Independent opposition politician Imran Khan isn't buying it.

In his opinion, any politician willing to contest an election under these conditions -- with the Constitution in abeyance and the Rule of Law suspended, with political activists in prison and severe restrictions on what the media can report -- is merely lending support to the ongoing emergency rule.

Imran Khan is prepared to boycott the elections unless the rule of law is restored, the Constitution reinstated, the Supreme Court reconstituted.

And the alliance of democratic opposition parties says they'll call for a boycott of the election unless emergency rule is lifted within the next four days.

There is no indication that a lifting of the emergency is being considered.

But Benazir Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif and all their friends are filing their papers anyway.

O the bets one must hedge!

Pakistan Is The Central Front In The Global War On The Rule Of Law

Above all else, the War on Terror is an assault on the Rule of Law. We can see this clearly in the news from Pakistan.

Late Saturday night, in a televised address, Pakistan's President and Army Chief of Staff, General Pervez Musharraf, said extremists posed a grave threat to democracy in Pakistan and that inaction in the face of this threat would be tantamount to national suicide.

What he meant was that the Supreme Court was about to rule his rigged "election" of October 6th illegal, and that inaction in the face of this threat would have cost him his job.

It is true that the Taliban and al Qaeda pose a threat in Pakistan. But clearly they do not threaten democracy!

There is no democracy in Pakistan. The country is ruled by a military dictator. He took office in a bloodless coup in 1999 and since then he has been both President and General in open defiance of a restriction against government officials holding two offices.

Pakistan, like the USA, has a system which theoretically provides indirect democracy. In Pakistan, rather than a state-wise electoral college, the president is elected by members of the national parliament and the provincial assemblies.

In the previous elections, 2002, Musharraf managed to remain in power despite popular opposition in an election that appeared to be rigged. The winners then voted for him to remain as President. Since then, the president and the parliament have worked together with the Americans in the War on Terror.

Under Pakistani law, each assembly is supposed to elect one president, and there should have been another general election before the next presidential election. But during the past few months, Musharraf has arranged to be "re-elected" by the same assemblies which elected him in 2002. This was clearly illegal and it appears the Supreme Court was about to say so.

In his declaration of national emergency -- martial law by another name -- Musharraf accused the Supreme Court of working at cross-purposes to the other branches of the government. By this he meant that the Supreme Court was about to uphold the rule of law.

It had done this several times in the past, much to Musharraf's inconvenience.

For instance, the court recently ordered the release of 60 "militants" who were being held as "Taliban sympathizers". The problem, according to Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammed Chaudhry, was that they had been held without charge. That was illegal in Pakistan -- until Saturday night.

In another case, the Chief Justice ordered the release of political activists who had been illegally imprisoned.

Chief Justice Chaudhry, by standing up for the rights of people who had been illegally detained -- and against the President General -- had shown himself to be an enemy of the War on Terror.

Musharraf had already tried to get rid of the Chief Justice. The groundswell of support for the embattled Chief Justice -- led by the country's lawyers and visible in huge rallies in one city after another -- eventually forced the President General to reinstate the Chief Justice.

Even more recently the court disciplined two high-ranking police officers after their force had made an unprovoked and bloody assault on lawyers who were demonstating peacefully against Musharraf's "re-election".

Musharraf on Saturday night accused the court of interfering with the police, and demoralizing them, thus weakening their resolve for the War on Terror.

The problem -- of course -- is that the War on Terror is a fraud.

The attack on Benazir Bhutto's self-staged welcome-home parade was billed as an attack on democracy. Unfortunately for those who appeared to believe that, there was no truth in the story.

Bhutto's return itself was an attack on democracy -- on a democracy that didn't even exist. It was a pretense of democracy, an insult to those who expected Musharraf to deliver on his promise of a transition to democracy.

There can be no such transition in Pakistan as long as Musharraf is in power, as long as Musharraf remains allied with the Americans against al Qaeda and the Taliban, for Pakistan is their home.

The CIA started funding and arming and training Muslim radicals in the late 1970s. They couldn't do this directly, so they used the notorious Pakistani intelligence service, the ISI, and did it by proxy. The force they raised wasn't called a terrorist network at the time. They were called freedom-fighters, and they ruined the Soviets in Afghanistan.

Now, after being implicated in the blackest op of all, this band of radicals have been the target of the War of the 21st Century. Mostly this war is fought by proxy in Pakistan, where Pakistani troops funded by American dollars have been fighting -- somewhat sporadically -- against the militants in the mountainous northwest, the wild border area between Pakistan and Afghanistan.

Pakistan has supposedly been America's number one ally in the War on Terror ever since 9/11. But there's a problem, because Pakistan is deeply implicated in 9/11 itself. We aren't supposed to know about that.

Until quite recently, militant Islamic fundamentalism had a home in the heart of Islamabad. Musharraf's decision to besiege and then attack Lal Masjid (the Red Mosque) triggered an increase in the frequency of attacks against his security forces. Who would have guessed?

The militants do conduct horrifying attacks, sometimes suicide attacks, in which innocent people are killed and injured. Most often the targets of the attacks are military or police forces engaged in offensive operations in the mountains. We are almost never told this; instead we are told they are attacks against democracy.

In fact democracy has nothing to do with it. The militants are not in favor of democracy. But neither is Musharraf.

Musharraf pretends to be concerned about the militants in the mountains, but his emergency powers have all been used against domestic political opposition. The makeup of the opposition is unlike any opposition ever seen in the USA. It is led by the lawyers, who go to the streets in black suits in defense of the rule of law.

This makes them opponents of the War on Terror, and they are beaten bloody for their efforts.

The public is being told that the Americans oppose this emergency crackdown. In fact it would never happen without their consent. For many months they have made it clear that they want Musharraf in power no matter what. If this is what it takes, so be it.

Of course they never admit this.

The Americans want Musharraf to hold elections on schedule, but this is about the only thing they seem to care about. If the elections proceed as planned but all the opposition leaders are in prison, does that qualify as democracy? It will if Bush has anything to say about it.

This crackdown, this implicit declaration of martial law, is bad for the secular progressive majority. It is bad for those who support the rule of law. It is bad for those who long for a return to something resembling democracy. But it is not bad for everybody.

It's good for the militants, because it attracts people to their cause.

It's good for the militarists in the government, because they thrive on power.

It's good for big business too -- the market says so.

Is it a dry run for Bush? Not exactly.

Bush is dealing with much different dynamics than Musharraf. For example: Where are our lawyers?

Protecting Democracy : Hundreds Of Pakistani Lawyers And Activists Arrested As Clampdown Continues

The military clampdown on Pakistani politics continues. At least five hundred lawyers, human rights activists and political opposition members have been arrested. All independent news media are being suppressed. The government has declared the Constitution "in abeyance" until further notice, and it's all been done by a General-President in the name of protecting democracy.

The geometry of this cynical ploy is quite simple. There's a small band of radicals on one end and a small band of militarists on the other. They are connected in many ways. If properly aligned, such a combination can crush a huge secular progressive majority in the middle. And that's what's happening in Pakistan at the moment.

I've been having horrible internet problems and I would like to do more with this post but it doesn't seem likely ... in the meantime I'll give you what I've got:

IHT : Pakistan rounds up opposition

About 500 opposition party workers, lawyers and human rights activists were arrested Sunday as the government of General Pervez Musharraf tried to consolidate its control after imposing emergency rule.

CNN : West urges Pakistan to lift martial law, return to democracy

Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf was under fire at home and abroad Sunday after declaring an indefinite state of emergency that the West is calling a blow to democracy.

BBC : Emergency may delay Pakistan poll

Planned elections in Pakistan could be delayed by up to a year after President Pervez Musharraf's imposition of emergency rule, the country's PM says.

WaPo : Political Crackdown Continues in Pakistan

Pakistan's government on Sunday continued a nationwide crackdown on the political opposition, the media and the courts, one day after President Pervez Musharraf imposed emergency rule and suspended the constitution in a bid to save his job.

Police throughout the country raided the homes of opposition party leaders and activists, arresting hundreds. Top lawyers were also taken into custody, and at the offices of the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan in the eastern city of Lahore, 70 activists were detained. Journalists covering the raid had their equipment confiscated by police, and were ordered off the premises.

CBC : Opposition politicians, lawyers rounded up in Pakistan: report

Pakistani police arrested opposition politicians, including the leader of exiled former prime minister Nawaz Sharif's party, as part a crackdown following President Gen. Pervez Musharraf's declaration of a state of emergency, Reuters reported Sunday.

In a move that sparked outcries from political opponents and the international community on Saturday, Musharraf also replaced the chief justice of the country's Supreme Court and had authorities round up opposition figues, cut phone lines in the capital Islamabad and took all but state television off the air.

Emergency Restrictions

CBC : Opposition politicians, lawyers rounded up in Pakistan: report

The order effectively suspends the country's constitution before a crucial Supreme Court ruling on Musharraf's future as president. The high court has been hearing constitutional arguments against his re-election last month.

BBC : Emergency may delay Pakistan poll

Emergency Restrictions
Constitutional safeguards on life and liberty curtailed
Police get wide powers of arrest
Suspects can be denied access to lawyers
Freedom of movement restricted
Private TV stations taken off air
New rules curtail media coverage of suicide bombings or militant activity
Chief justice replaced, others made to swear oath of loyalty
Supreme Court banned from rescinding emergency order

Official Justifications

IHT : Pakistan rounds up opposition

Musharraf announced the emergency decree, under which the Constitution was suspended and most of the Supreme Court was dismissed, on state-run television just after midnight. In a 45-minute speech, the president said he had declared the emergency to limit terrorist attacks and "preserve the democratic transition that I initiated eight years back." He did not say how long the state of emergency would be maintained.

The general, dressed in civilian clothes, quoted the U.S. president Abraham Lincoln, citing his suspension of some rights during the American Civil War as justification for the state of emergency in Pakistan.

CNN : West urges Pakistan to lift martial law, return to democracy

Musharraf made the declaration Saturday in reaction to what he said was judicial activism by the state's high court. Musharraf has been tussling with the Supreme Court since at least March, when he removed Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammed Chaudhry, citing judicial misconduct.
...
Pakistani Information Minister Tariq Azim Khan said the move -- which suspends the constitution and expands Musharraf's powers -- was necessary because "things had gone totally haywire."

BBC : Emergency may delay Pakistan poll

Gen Musharraf says he declared the emergency to stop Pakistan "committing suicide", because the country was in a crisis caused by militant violence and an unruly judiciary

The moves came as the Supreme Court was due to rule on the legality of Gen Musharraf's October election victory.
...
In a TV address on Saturday evening, Gen Musharraf explained his decision, saying the current situation had forced him into making "some very painful decisions".
...
"Extremists are roaming around freely in the country, and they are not scared of law-enforcement agencies," the president said.

"Inaction at this moment is suicide for Pakistan and I cannot allow this country to commit suicide."

CBC : Opposition politicians, lawyers rounded up in Pakistan: report

In a national address Saturday, Musharraf insisted his actions were necessary to curb a rise in extremism in Pakistan, as well as judicial paralysis.

"I suspect that Pakistan's sovereignty is in danger unless timely action is taken," said Musharraf, who was wearing civilian clothes and spoke firmly and calmly.

"Pakistan is on the verge of destabilization . Inaction at this moment is suicide for Pakistan and I cannot allow this country to commit suicide."

Activists Arrested

IHT : Pakistan rounds up opposition

About 500 opposition party workers, lawyers and human rights activists were arrested Sunday as the government of General Pervez Musharraf tried to consolidate its control after imposing emergency rule.

CNN : West urges Pakistan to lift martial law, return to democracy

As part of the state of emergency, the Pakistani government has a list of about 1,500 opposition figures, mostly activists and lawyers to be rounded up, according to police sources and witnesses.
...
The head of Pakistan's human rights commission, Asma Jahangir, said she, too, was under house arrest and that Musharraf "has lost his marbles."

Khan, the information minister, said the house arrests are "a very temporary measure" and were targeting "people who have been causing law and order situations."

BBC : Emergency may delay Pakistan poll

Rights have been suspended, media has been restricted and hundreds of people arrested under the emergency decree.

Mr Aziz said 400 to 500 "preventative arrests" had been made so far, and said the emergency, imposed by Gen Musharraf on Saturday, would last for "as long as is necessary".

WaPo : Political Crackdown Continues in Pakistan

Up to 500 opposition activists had been arrested in the last 24 hours, Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz said Sunday.

Media Restrictions

IHT : Pakistan rounds up opposition

About a dozen privately run television news stations remained off the air, and international channels, including the BBC and CNN, were suspended. In the city of Lahore, police officers armed with tear gas tried to break up a meeting of regime opponents at the headquarters of the Pakistan Human Rights Commission. They took dozens of people away in police vans.
...
The director of the private television channel Aaj TV, Wamiq Zuberi, said a magistrate accompanied by five vans of gun-toting police officers showed up at the channel's studios here Saturday night. They wanted to confiscate the channel's outdoor broadcasting van, Zuberi said. But the magistrate did not have a warrant, and the workers at the studio stood their ground, forcing the officials to leave, Zuberi said.

Aziz, the prime minister, said Sunday that the government planned to work on "a code of conduct" for broadcasters.

BBC : Emergency may delay Pakistan poll

Tough new media restrictions are controlling the news available throughout Pakistan: all non-state TV stations and some radio channels, including international services such as BBC World TV, have been taken off air.

Independent newspapers have been allowed to continue publishing, but Gen Musharraf's decree severely limits what they can report.

WaPo : Political Crackdown Continues in Pakistan

Independent television stations remained off the air Sunday, and Pakistani journalists said they were unsure when their broadcasts would be restored. One prominent news anchor, Kashif Abbasi, said the government was pressuring the stations to sign a new code of conduct that would impose severe restrictions on what the stations could report. Abbasi said journalists would resist the move. "Do we have a choice? We can't sit there and report, but not talk about the president, the prime minister, the government or its policies," he said.

The only televised news Sunday came from the state-run channel, which ran clips from Musharraf's speech to the nation Saturday night in which he blamed terrorists and activist judges for forcing him to declare emergency rule. State-run TV also broadcast a critical segment on media restrictions in arch-rival India.

Police / Security / Military

BBC : Emergency may delay Pakistan poll

Local newspapers and key opposition leader Benazir Bhutto accused Gen Musharraf of bringing in martial law without formally declaring it.

But Pakistan's attorney general said the prime minister and parliament remained in place and the civilian government would continue to function.
...
Small protests have started in the capital, Islamabad, where police and security forces are on the streets surrounding key sites.
...
After a calm start to Sunday, a few dozen people staged a brief protest near the parliament building in Islamabad before police moved in to break up the gathering.

Several people were dragged away and arrested, reports the BBC's Syed Shoaib Hasan, in the city.

More protests are expected throughout the rest of the day, he adds, with police appearing ready to use force against unauthorised demonstrations.

WaPo : Political Crackdown Continues in Pakistan

The police presence in the capital, Islamabad, remained heavy Sunday, and an air of tense calm prevailed over much of the city.

Benazir Bhutto

IHT : Pakistan rounds up opposition

Bhutto spent Sunday at her residence in Karachi. Leaders of her party, the Pakistan People's Party, said she would fly to Islamabad to hold talks with other opposition parties about how to proceed. But Bhutto did not show up here.

In interviews with foreign television channels, Bhutto, who returned to Pakistan after years in exile in October with the backing of the United States, appealed for free and fair elections. But sympathizers to her cause said her options for influencing the situation appeared limited.

Organizing large protests under emergency rule, and after the bomb attack on her arrival procession Oct. 18 that killed 140 people, would be difficult, said Najem Sethi, the editor in chief of The Daily Times.

"Verbally she will be very critical," Sethi said. "But she is not going to participate in protests. She's going to make a token representation. Behind the scenes she will work with the government for elections as soon as possible."

BBC : Emergency may delay Pakistan poll

Ms Bhutto, who recently returned to Pakistan from self-imposed exile, flew back to Karachi from a trip abroad upon hearing news of Gen Musharraf's decision.

She confirmed that troops were not surrounding her Karachi home, contrary to some earlier reports, and laid out her demands for the holding free and fair elections.

"We the political parties are calling for the restoration of the constitution, and for the holding of the elections under an independent election commission," she told the BBC.

There is no word yet whether she plans to enter dialogue with the president or to lead opposition to his rule.

CBC : Opposition politicians, lawyers rounded up in Pakistan: report

In an interview with CBC News late Saturday from Karachi, former prime minister Benazir Bhutto accused Musharraf of taking Pakistan away from democracy and "turning the clock back towards dictatorship."

"If you really want to get rid of extremism, you have to get rid of dictatorship," Bhutto said. "It's an unfortunate day in our country's history."

Bhutto, who was in Dubai when Musharraf issued the order, recently ended eight years in exile and has been in talks with Musharraf's camp about countering Islamic extremism by coming together to form a possible pro-Western alliance after parliamentary elections, which were slated for January.
...
Bhutto, who held a press conference at her residence in Karachi after her arrival in Pakistan, said she would hold talks with other opposition parties to "build the domestic pressure" against Musharraf to reverse the decision and hold the elections on schedule.

Other Opposition

BBC : Emergency may delay Pakistan poll

Among the hundreds of people arrested since the declaration was Javed Hashmi, acting head of former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif's Pakistan Muslim League.

Gen Musharraf, he said as he was taken away, would pay a price for his decision to restrict freedoms.

"Musharraf's days are numbered. Time has come to end the political role of the army."

WaPo : Political Crackdown Continues in Pakistan

Ahsan Iqbal, spokesman for an opposition party led by former prime minister Nawaz Sharif, said up to 1,000 activists from his party had been arrested, including top leaders. Iqbal said Musharraf was "guilty of treason" for suspending the constitution.

Responding to Secretary of State Rice's statement on reviewing aid to Pakistan, Sharif called for even more U.S. action.

"Just saying that we will review the aid is not enough. I think the Western countries, especially the United States of America, must condemn this in the strongest terms and must urge Musharraf to reverse all that he's done yesterday," Sharif said in a telephone interview with Sky News.

Sharif is in Saudi Arabia, after being arrested and deported there in September shortly after arriving in Pakistan from exile.

CBC : Opposition politicians, lawyers rounded up in Pakistan: report

In September, Sharif was deported only hours after he returned to his home country after seven years of exile after being ousted by Musharraf in a 1999 coup.

"Musharraf's days are numbered. Time has come to end the political role of the army," Reuters quoted Javed Hashmi, acting president of Sharif's Pakistan Muslim League, as telling reporters before being whisked away by police in the central city of Multan.
...
Another opposition politician, former cricketer Imran Khan, told the BBC he had been placed under house arrest.

Lawyers

IHT : Pakistan rounds up opposition

Around the country, at least 80 lawyers were arrested in an apparent bid to head off demonstrations that lawyers' groups had planned for Monday.
...
A government spokesman, Tariq Aziz Khan, said the arrests of lawyers were "preventive measures" taken because of a "threat to future law and order."

In the spring, lawyers spearheaded opposition to Musharraf after he fired the chief justice, Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry. The Supreme Court later reinstated Chaudhry, who continued to irritate Musharraf. By the end of last week, the general seemed unsure that the Supreme Court would rule favorably on his re-election.

BBC : Emergency may delay Pakistan poll

Pakistani lawyers announced they would strike on Monday in protest at the president's decision.

WaPo : Political Crackdown Continues in Pakistan

Asma Jahangir, a leading human rights attorney, reported in an e-mail that she had been ordered to stay confined to her home for 90 days. She called it ironic that that Musharraf "had to clamp down on the press and the judiciary to curb terrorism. Those he has arrested are progressive, secular minded people while the terrorists are offered negotiations and ceasefires."

Opposition groups did not mass any large protests on Sunday, but they vowed to do so later in the week.

"Lawyers and civil society will challenge the government," Jahangir wrote, "and the scene is likely to get uglier."

Supreme Court

IHT : Pakistan rounds up opposition

Musharraf accused the Supreme Court of releasing 61 men who he said were under investigation for terrorist activities. "Judicial activism," he said, had demoralized the security forces, hurt the fight against terrorism and slowed the spread of democracy. "Obstacles are being created in the way of democratic process," he said, "I think for vested, personal interests, against the interest of the country."
...
Musharraf acted just days before the Supreme Court was due to decide on the legality of his re-election on Oct. 6.

Among the dozens of lawyers arrested was the president of the Supreme Court bar association, Aitzaz Ahsan, who has opposed Musharraf in legal arguments and in political protests, said Ayesha Tammy Haq, an Islamabad lawyer.

"If you want to take the country away from Talibanization, these are the people who can do it, the secular middle class," Haq said as she waited Sunday at the Adiala jail in Rawalpindi to see Ahsan.
...
Under the emergency declaration, the Supreme Court justices were ordered to take an oath to abide by a "provisional constitutional order" that replaces the country's existing Constitution. Seven justices rejected the order Saturday night, according to an aide to Chaudhry.

Hours later, the state-run news media reported that three justices generally seen as supporting Musharraf had taken an oath to uphold the emergency measure. And it was announced that Chaudhry had been replaced by a pro-government member of the Supreme Court bench, Abdul Hamid Doger, as chief justice.

CNN : West urges Pakistan to lift martial law, return to democracy

The Supreme Court -- which reinstated Chaudhry in July in what many called a political blow to Musharraf -- was amid hearing arguments from opposition leaders who said that Musharraf's victory in the October elections should be overturned because Musharraf was not eligible to serve a third term while heading the country's military.
...
Chaudhry is one of seven Supreme Court judges placed under house arrest after the court declared Musharraf's state of emergency illegal under the constitution.

Shortly after the court ruling, troops went to Chaudhry's office and told him he was fired, the judge's office said. Massive protests ensued after Chaudhry was removed from the bench earlier this year.

BBC : Emergency may delay Pakistan poll

Following the announcement of emergency rule, the country's chief justice was replaced and the Supreme Court surrounded by troops.

Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry and eight other judges refused to endorse the emergency order, declaring it unconstitutional, resulting in Mr Chaudhry's dismissal.

The Supreme Court was to decide whether Gen Musharraf was eligible to run for re-election last month while remaining army chief.

Fears were growing in the government that the court could rule against Gen Musharraf.

WaPo : Political Crackdown Continues in Pakistan

At the residence of the former chief justice, Iftikhar Mohammed Chaudhry, hundreds of security officers kept visitors away. Chaudhry was fired by Musharraf on Saturday, along with at least six others Supreme Court judges.

Out of 17 judges on the bench, five agreed to take an oath to uphold Musharraf's new provisional constitution. The government pressured several others Sunday to sign the oath, or lose their jobs.

CBC : Opposition politicians, lawyers rounded up in Pakistan: report

Seven of the 18 Supreme Court judges immediately condemned the emergency measures.

"Under the constitutional order, judges will have to swear allegiance to the emergency powers," freelance journalist Graham Usher told CBC News. "Any judge who does not do that can be dismissed."

Justice Hameed Dogar replaced Iftekhar Chaudhry as the country's chief justice. Musharraf tried to remove Chaudhry from the bench in March over alleged abuse of authority, but the court declared the suspension illegal and reinstated him in July after a series of street protests.

Chaudhry has been outspoken in defending the independence of the judiciary.

The Future Of Democracy

IHT : Pakistan rounds up opposition

Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz said Sunday at a news conference that new parliamentary elections, which had been expected in January, could be "up to a year" away. He said that as many as 500 opposition activists had been arrested nationwide.

CNN : West urges Pakistan to lift martial law, return to democracy

Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf was under fire at home and abroad Sunday after declaring an indefinite state of emergency that the West is calling a blow to democracy.
...
[Information Minister Tariq Azim] Khan said parliamentary elections slated for January have been postponed indefinitely, but Pakistani Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz said later no such decision had been made.

BBC : Emergency may delay Pakistan poll

Shaukat Aziz told a news conference that the government remained committed to the democratic process.

But he said parliament might change the date of elections planned for January, and gave no end date for the emergency.

WaPo : Political Crackdown Continues in Pakistan

[Prime Minister Shaukat] Aziz said the extraordinary measures would remain in place "as long as it is necessary." Aziz said parliamentary elections could be postponed up to a year, but no decision has been made regarding a delay.

CBC : Opposition politicians, lawyers rounded up in Pakistan: report

It is not known whether the state of emergency will delay or cancel the elections.

American Reactions

IHT : Pakistan rounds up opposition

The U.S. secretary of state, Condoleezza Rice, joining other foreign governments in expressing concern about Pakistan's decision to suspend its Constitution, said Washington was reviewing billions of dollars in aid to the country, The Associated Press reported. Britain also said it was examining its aid package.
...
Musharraf summoned foreign diplomats, including the U.S. ambassador, Anne Patterson, to a meeting Sunday to explain the reasons for his action, according to diplomats.

The emergency rule came into force less than 24 hours after Musharraf met here with the senior U.S. military commander in the region, Admiral William Fallon, who warned the Pakistani leader that U.S. military assistance would be in jeopardy if he introduced martial law, diplomats said.

Soon after Musharraf's emergency decree, Washington officials said it was unlikely that the military aid would be cut.
...
Rice, speaking to reporters in Jerusalem on Sunday, also urged Musharraf to call elections and repeated U.S. displeasure at emergency rule, which she advised against in two telephone calls to him on Wednesday, news agencies reported.

"Obviously we are going to have to review the situation with aid, in part because we have to see what may be triggered by certain statutes," Rice said.

The United States has provided about $11 billion to Pakistan since 2001, when Musharraf made a strategic shift to be an ally with the United States after the Sept. 11 attacks. Rice said Washington would review its aid in light of the new emergency measures, though the Pentagon said earlier that the emergency rule would not affect its military support to Pakistan.

"Some of the aid that goes to Pakistan is directly related to the counterterrorism mission," Rice told reporters traveling with her in the Middle East. "We just have to review the situation."

CNN : West urges Pakistan to lift martial law, return to democracy

"It is in the best interest of Pakistan and in the best interest of the Pakistani people for there to be a prompt return to a constitutional course, for there to be an affirmation that elections will be held for a new parliament, and for all parties to act with restraint in what is obviously a very difficult situation," she said.

Later in the day, Rice said the U.S. would review its financial aid package to Pakistan, a key ally in the war on terror. She conceded the matter would be complicated because much of the aid goes to counterterrorism.

BBC : Emergency may delay Pakistan poll

US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has said Washington is reviewing the aid which it gives to Pakistan in the wake of Gen Musharraf's decision.

"Obviously we are going to have to review the situation with aid, in part because we have to see what may be triggered by certain statutes," Ms Rice said.

In recent years Gen Musharraf has been a key ally in Washington's war on terror and has received about $10bn in aid since 2001.

"Some of the aid that goes to Pakistan is directly related to the counterterrorism mission," Ms Rice said, adding that that complicated the issue.

WaPo : Political Crackdown Continues in Pakistan

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said Sunday that the United States would review its $150 million a month assistance program to Pakistan in response to Musharraf's declaration of emergency rule.

CBC : Opposition politicians, lawyers rounded up in Pakistan: report

"The U.S. has made clear it does not support extraconstitutional measures because those measures take Pakistan away from the path of democracy and civilian rule," U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said.

However, Pentagon spokesman Geoff Morrell said Musharraf's declaration does not affect U.S. military support of Pakistan, which Morrell called "a very important ally in the war on terror."

Other Foreign Reactions

CNN : West urges Pakistan to lift martial law, return to democracy

Javier Solana, foreign policy chief for the 27-nation European Union, also implored Musharraf to keep the January elections on track. Solana told The Associated Press he realizes Pakistan is facing difficulties in its political and security situations, but "any deviation from the general democratic process cannot be a solution."

Solana, in a statement, urged Musharraf "to abide by the rule of law, notably to respect the boundaries of the constitution" and asked that political parties show "restraint to facilitate a quick return to normalcy."

British Foreign Secretary David Miliband also expressed concerns about the state of emergency, saying Pakistan's future "rests on harnessing the power of democracy and the rule of law to achieve the goals of stability, development and countering terrorism."

WaPo : Political Crackdown Continues in Pakistan

The international advocacy group Human Rights Watch issued a statement condemning the move as "an appalling attack on human rights defenders."

Other Pakistani Reactions

CNN : West urges Pakistan to lift martial law, return to democracy

Pakistanis reacted to the country's turmoil Sunday with a mixture of anger and apathy, according to AP.

Said factory worker Faisal Sayed, "Pakistan is bad because of one person: Musharraf. He has ruined our country."

But day laborer Togul Khan, 38, had a more cynical outlook as he waited for work on an Islamabad street corner, AP reported.

"What's the point of talking about this?" he asked. "The politicians have lifted Pakistan into the sky and spun it round before bringing it crashing down to earth -- but nothing will change for us."

WaPo : Political Crackdown Continues in Pakistan

Near the Supreme Court, a small group of Pakistanis gathered in hopes of starting a rally against Musharraf. But police ordered the crowd to disperse, citing a ban on public gatherings of more than three people in one place.

"We're in despair and we don't know what to do," said Sofia Shakil, an Islamabad resident. "Just when things looked like they couldn't get any worse . . . "

Later in the afternoon, a group of several dozen protesters shouting "We want democracy now!" attempted to march to Chaudhry's house. But the police blocked their path, and began to make arrests.

"We don't need martial law imposed on us," said Laila Ashraf, a protester. "We need to assert our rights."

CBC : Opposition politicians, lawyers rounded up in Pakistan: report

Ottawa officially condemned the crackdown urged its government to reinstate judges and allow free elections.

In a statement released Saturday, Foreign Affairs Minister Maxime Bernier called for all sides to refrain from violence and respect human rights. The Foreign Affairs Department also issued an official travel warning advising Canadians against all travel to Pakistan.

Taliban / al Qaeda

IHT : Pakistan rounds up opposition

the general tailored his decree to emphasize the necessity of continuing the fight against Islamic extremists sympathetic to the Taliban and Al Qaeda.