Pakistan risks political crisis unless its ruling coalition can agree on how to restore judges ousted by President Pervez Musharraf, a Cabinet minister warned.
Musharraf imposed emergency rule and purged the Supreme Court in November in order to halt legal challenges to his US-backed presidency.
Opponents who won February elections and have taken over the government have vowed to bring the judges back — a move that would raise pressure on Musharraf to resign.
But the failure of coalition leaders’ to agree on exactly how to do it has raised the prospect that their six-week-old administration could fall apart.
RESOLUTION
Doubts arose about a plan for the country’s parliament to pass a resolution today calling for the return of the judges, after there was no progress at talks held on Friday in London between the two main ruling parties’ leaders, Asif Ali Zardari and Nawaz Sharif.
Ahsan Iqbal, a key Sharif aide, forecast however that the two sides would hammer out a compromise by today — the second self-imposed deadline for action to restore the judges.
“I think there will be an acceptable solution,” he said.
Party leaders were staying on in London to continue their negotiations, he said.
But both sides are showing signs of frustration.
Sharif, a former prime minister whose government was ousted in Musharraf’s 1999 coup, argued that the government could issue a simple order to bring back the judges after the parliamentary resolution.
Sharif has pressed hard for the judges’ return — and for Musharraf’s ouster.
But a senior party colleague of Zardari reacted sharply on Saturday to Sharif’s additional suggestion that police could escort the justices back to their jobs.
“If police restore the judges ... then there will be a political and constitutional crisis,” Information Minister Sherry Rehman said.
“We need to be responsible and avoid unnecessary confrontation at a time when Pakistan is beset with so much conflicts and economic and social pressures,” she said.
Rehman was referring to concern that Musharraf and his allies could seek to block the return of Iftikhar Mohammed Chaudhry as chief justice.
ACCUSATION
Musharraf has accused Chaudhry of corruption and conspiring against his plan to guide Pakistan back to democracy after eight years of his military rule.
Zardari insists judges sworn into the Supreme Court after the purge be retained so they do not oppose the government in a legal tussle that would cast the country into political turmoil.
Sharif’s party has threatened to quit the Cabinet — but not the coalition — if the today’s deadline is not met.
DIALOGUE: US president-elect Donald Trump on his Truth Social platform confirmed that he had spoken with Xi, saying ‘the call was a very good one’ for the US and China US president-elect Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) discussed Taiwan, trade, fentanyl and TikTok in a phone call on Friday, just days before Trump heads back to the White House with vows to impose tariffs and other measures on the US’ biggest rival. Despite that, Xi congratulated Trump on his second term and pushed for improved ties, the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs said. The call came the same day that the US Supreme Court backed a law banning TikTok unless it is sold by its China-based parent company. “We both attach great importance to interaction, hope for
‘GREAT OPPRTUNITY’: The Paraguayan president made the remarks following Donald Trump’s tapping of several figures with deep Latin America expertise for his Cabinet Paraguay President Santiago Pena called US president-elect Donald Trump’s incoming foreign policy team a “dream come true” as his nation stands to become more relevant in the next US administration. “It’s a great opportunity for us to advance very, very fast in the bilateral agenda on trade, security, rule of law and make Paraguay a much closer ally” to the US, Pena said in an interview in Washington ahead of Trump’s inauguration today. “One of the biggest challenges for Paraguay was that image of an island surrounded by land, a country that was isolated and not many people know about it,”
‘FIGHT TO THE END’: Attacking a court is ‘unprecedented’ in South Korea and those involved would likely face jail time, a South Korean political pundit said Supporters of impeached South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol yesterday stormed a Seoul court after a judge extended the impeached leader’s detention over his ill-fated attempt to impose martial law. Tens of thousands of people had gathered outside the Seoul Western District Court on Saturday in a show of support for Yoon, who became South Korea’s first sitting head of state to be arrested in a dawn raid last week. After the court extended his detention on Saturday, the president’s supporters smashed windows and doors as they rushed inside the building. Hundreds of police officers charged into the court, arresting dozens and denouncing an
CYBERSCAM: Anne, an interior decorator with mental health problems, spent a year and a half believing she was communicating with Brad Pitt and lost US$855,259 A French woman who revealed on TV how she had lost her life savings to scammers posing as Brad Pitt has faced a wave of online harassment and mockery, leading the interview to be withdrawn on Tuesday. The woman, named as Anne, told the Seven to Eight program on the TF1 channel how she had believed she was in a romantic relationship with the Hollywood star, leading her to divorce her husband and transfer 830,000 euros (US$855,259). The scammers used fake social media and WhatsApp accounts, as well as artificial intelligence image-creating technology to send Anne selfies and other messages
RSS