NEW JERSEY, JULY 27 - Amid turmoil sparked by the Lal Masjid
crisis, suicide attacks, and US threat to
launch direct "strikes inside Pakistan", President Gen Musharraf
air-dashed to Abu Dhabi today and met former Prime Minister
Benazir Bhutto, apparently to clinch a deal to ensure his
re-election and her return home from self-exile.
While officials close to Musharraf informally told the media
in Islamabad that the two would be meeting at the instance
of a third country, believed to be United States, Benazir
Bhutto cancelled a parliamentary party meeting of her
Pakistan Peoples' Party (PPP) in London and reached Abdu
Dhabi today.
Significantly, Benazir was accompanied by her close aide
former Director General of Federal Investigation
Agency (FIA) Rehman Malik, while Gen Musharraf's delegation
included ISI Chief Gen Kiani.
According to sources privy to the meeting, the almost "dead"
deal has been resurrected. Musharraf is seeking Benazir's
help to stay on as president after retiring from the
military.
Bhutto reportedly said she will get back to him on the
issues discussed.
According to news reports, this was their second
meeting and the two were in regular touch over telephone.
The two met for almost two hours with their delegations as
well as one-on-one.
The meeting comes after Benazir's recent remarks that her
party would lose votes in the polls due to be held later
this year if she aligned with the General in the aftermath
of the recent supreme court judgment reinstating suspended
Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry.
The meeting also took place against the backdrop of attempts
by militant students today to re-occupy the Lal Masjid which
saw bloody military assault earlier this month that killed scores of
people. Its capture resulted in a spate of suicide bomb
attacks mostly in tribal areas targeting security forces.
Today, capital Islamabad saw its second suicide
bombing - in less than two weeks since the first one on July
17. Latest count of
people killed in the latest suicide bombing is 15 with more than 70 injured, some of them critically.
Earlier, on July 17, at a lawyer's rally which was being
held to welcome the
suspended Chief Justice, the capital saw its first suicide
attack in which 17 people were killed
and more than 40 were injured. It is believed that the PPP camp at the
rally was the target because of Benazir's candid support of
Musharraf's Lal Masjid military operation that left more
than 102 dead, with many still remaining unaccounted for.
AAJ TV has reported that PML (Nawaz) President
Shahbaz Sharif has declined to meet the General who is to
visit Jeddah after his UAE trip as part of his two-day
flying visit to the
Middle East. The official story given out is that he will exchange views with the leadership of Saudi
Arabia and UAE on issues of terrorism and extremism in
the region.
Shahbaz has been living in Jeddah as part of a 10-year exile
deal which was signed in 2000 between the Kingdom and
Musharraf's government.
It is said that with US war drums beating ever faster, Gen
Musharraf has reportedly become nervous. If troops going
into the mosque could inflame the tribal areas, imagine the
reaction foreign troops in the tribal areas could provoke,
said one Pakistani-American.
The United States recently upped the ante on war on
terrorism by contemplating "strikes inside
Pakistan" to get ride of "Al Qaeda and Taliban safe havens".
Unconfirmed reports say several hundred Western special
forces are already operating in the tribal region, without
Pakistan's prior knowledge and or permission.
A contact in Rawalpindi familiar with goings-on in the
capital's twin city, which is home to the military's top
brass, told Asia Times Online (ATOL) on condition of
anonymity of President Musharraf's "desperate efforts" to
speak to Washington at the highest level and request some
breathing space.
According to ATOL's contact, Washington insisted that
Islamabad press on relentlessly by military means against
Taliban and al-Qaeda assets in Pakistan, saying that NATO
would be supportive. Apparently, a personal request by
Musharraf to speak to US President George W Bush about being
given time for matters to cool off was declined, wrote Syed
Saleem Shahzad, ATOL's Islamabad Bureau Chief in his
latest news analysis.
In effect, said Shahzad, Washington is brushing aside Musharraf's concerns
over an extremist backlash of momentous proportions should
foreign forces join in the fray in the tribal areas, let
alone threaten the General's hold on power.
While Washington wants to take action in Pakistan, it does
not want the country to turn into a jihadist playing field,
so it is preparing for the consequences, the article has observed. This
includes the encouragement of liberal democratic forces to
step into any power vacuum should Musharraf be forced out or
choose to walk into the sunset. "Quick regime changes have
in the past worked to take the steam out of potentially
disastrous backlashes, and given the military time to
regroup."
An informed observer told DesPardes.com that, "Musharraf and
the establishment is attempting to form a "grand alliance"
of liberal and moderate forces to face the deteriorating
situation in the country".
The United States however wants Gen Musharraf to remain in
the loop, but Stratfor has said in its latest news
analysis published today, that some corps
commanders and intelligence heads have asked him to step
down.
"Stepping down does not necessarily mean that Musharraf
would leave the political scene altogether. Rather he likely
will be forced to relinquish the post of army chief and try
to stay on as a civilian president while sharing powers with
a coalition government led by Benazir following
parliamentary elections, Stratfor has speculated.
At this stage it is unclear whether Musharraf will be
successful in his efforts to reach a compromise -- as these
efforts could be too little and too late, the analysis
concluded.
Given United States' domestic pre-election dynamics, leaders
from both sides of the political divide have taken "hawkish"
stances based on latest intel on terrorism vis-a-vis Gen
Musharraf's role as the key ally.
The US have been told not once
but many a time by our own political personalities that the
General "cannot be trusted". It seems the US have
decided to take up the advice seriously in its "national
security interests".
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