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Sharif planning return to Pakistan

Javed Hashmi, leader of Pakistan's ousted Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif's Muslim League party, flashes victory signs after his release from a jail in Multan, Pakistan, on Thursday. Associated Press (Associated Press / The Spokesman-Review)
Sadaqat Jan Associated Press
Javed Hashmi, leader of Pakistan's ousted Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif's Muslim League party, flashes victory signs after his release from a jail in Multan, Pakistan, on Thursday. Associated Press (Associated Press / The Spokesman-Review)

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan – Opposition leader Nawaz Sharif will make another attempt to return from exile, his party said Thursday, setting up a new confrontation with President Gen. Pervez Musharraf before critical parliamentary elections.

With Saudi leaders appearing to back Sharif’s desire to leave Saudi Arabia, Musharraf appeared to have few options for fending off the return of a former prime minister who would also challenge pro-Western Benazir Bhutto in her bid to return to power as premier.

Sharif’s plan was announced hours after the Supreme Court, with judges appointed by Musharraf, swept away the last legal obstacles to his new five-year term as president.

The U.S.-allied leader was expected to give up his dual post as army chief within days in hopes of cooling domestic and foreign criticism over his suspension of the constitution and assumption of emergency powers three weeks ago.

But discontent has intensified this year over Musharraf’s rule, which began with a coup that ousted Sharif as prime minister in 1999. A return by Sharif would be sure to bolster the anti-government campaign.

Presidential spokesman Rashid Qureshi declined to say what Musharraf would do if Sharif tried to enter Pakistan. Sharif was swiftly deported to Saudi Arabia when he tried to return in September.

That expulsion was supported by Saudi Arabia’s government, but Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain, president of Musharraf’s ruling Pakistan Muslim League-Q party, said Sharif now had “some deal” with Saudi authorities.

“We are ready to face him and he has to face the people” in the parliamentary elections set for Jan. 9, Hussain said on Dawn News television.

Also Thursday, the Commonwealth, a 53-nation group composed mainly of Britain and its former colonies, voted at a meeting in Uganda to suspend Pakistan’s membership after Musharraf failed to meet the association’s Thursday deadline for him to lift the crackdown and quit as army chief.

The group “welcomes the release of detainees, but is concerned about the arrest of journalists and lawyers,” its secretary-general, Don McKinnon, told reporters.