Political Regression in Pakistan

...Washington's current attitude toward the two South Asian countries outrages New Delhi...

...Indeed, Musharraf's decision to try Sharif for treason smacks of the vendetta Zia launched against Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, who was hanged for conspiring to murder the father of one of his political opponents...

...Najam Sethi, the respected editor of the Lahore Friday Times, who was harassed by Sharif, has pointed out that a Gallup poll taken a day after the coup found most Pakistanis wanted an unelected, interim government of "clean technocrats" to rule for at least two years, rather than a return to unbridled constitutional democracy...

...Moreover, in a curious display of evenhandedness the U.S...

...It is perceived as overly "balanced" in the light of India's firm democratic record...

...Despite official denials, the Kashmiri mujahedin were strongly backed by the Pakistani Army...

...That Musharraf will be no exception at a time when Pakistan and India have demonstrated nuclear capabilities (see NL, June 1-15,1998) is cause for apprehension throughout the world...

...This drains both nations of resources they urgently need for development...

...Darryl D'Monte, a longtime contributor to these pages, is a journalist and editor who specializes in Asian affairs...

...This is a tragic comment on the extent to which Pakistan's civilian rulers have treated the country as theirprivate fiefdom...

...What apparently happened is that General Musharraf feared the Prime Minister, with whom he always had a troubled relationship, would try to cut him down to size...

...On the contrary, at a recent Congressional hearing a former CIA operative in Pakistan openly suggested that the Clinton Administration should deal with the new regime to regain its leverage with the Army...

...Many Indians thought this would weaken the influence of the Army chief, General Pervez Musharraf, even if it did not strengthen the hand of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif...

...In any event, the U.S...

...Since the World Bank takes its cue from the U S., resentment has been exacerbated by its keeping on hold a $2.4 billion loan suspended after India's 1998 nuclear tests...

...There is speculation that notwithstanding the support for Islamic terrorists in Pakistan and Kashmir, the General has offered to help the U.S...

...Nawaz Sharif plundered Pakistan as if there was no tomorrow...

...The armies of the two countries now confront each other across the border within a nuclear environment...

...Such revenge is bound to further destabilize Pakistan politically and make it harder to restore the rule of law...

...A military ruler would presumably be able to withstand the fervor of these hardline zealots more easily...

...The government is keeping an open mind on talks with Islamabad, but is conscious of the precedent General Zia set in his refusal to return to civilian rule and intransigence toward New Delhi...

...Writes Sethi: "Benazir Bhutto was caught, along with her husband, with her hands in the till instead of on the steering wheel...

...This was double-talk...

...That wouldseem to be the case when one considers the added factor of Islamic fundamentalists goading anyone in power to foment hate against "Hindu" India...

...He had to bow out when he faced a rebellion in East Pakistan that became a war for liberation of the new country of Bangladesh...

...General Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq ruled for over 11 years and was killed in an air crash, said to have been arranged by his internal opponents or, alternatively, by Indian intelligence...

...Following the sanctions that were imposed on both sides by the United States and some other industrial countries after last year's nuclear tests, Pakistan owes some $32 billion to international creditors...

...For their part, Indian diplomats are aware that anyone they negotiate peace with may not be around to see the process to its logical conclusion—a situation contributing to their discomfiture...

...And India sees the call for renewed peace talks as merely an effort to show the world that the General is the one anxious to normalize relations with India...

...Indian analysts realize that New Delhi has to talk to whoever is ruling in Islamabad—whether dressed in khaki or white...

...Earlier, General Muhhammad Ayub Khan presided with an iron fist for more than a decade...

...It has not gone along with Britain and the Commonwealth nations, which suspended aid to Pakistan...

...The Bhuttos have recently gone on trial in London for not paying the decorator of their multimillion-dollar British mansion...

...The summer skirmishes were not about that border...

...has not carried out its threat to declare Pakistan a terrorist state...

...Musharraf, the theory goes, calculated that unless he moved fast to dislodge the civilian government and take control, the Army's role would be circumscribed...

...It has been able to roll over approximately $3 billion in soft loans, but is dependent on $268 million promised by the International Monetary Fund that was suspended after the coup...

...That the generals continued to cast a long shadow over Islamabad's civilian government was made amply clear even before the military takeover—during the skirmishes in disputed Kashmir this summer...

...But the State Department stopped short of condemning the military takeover, even as it called for a return to civilian rule and demanded that Sharif and others not be harmed while in custody...

...Soon after assuming power and placing Nawaz Sharif under house arrest— he will shortly be tried for treason—Musharraf announced that he was ordering his troops to withdraw from the IndoPakistan border, and he invited India to resume negotiations on restoring peace...

...Pakistan, being much smaller, is more vulnerable to economic problems...

...negotiate with Afghanistan over its harboring Saudi terrorism mastermind Osama Bin Laden...

...After all, it seemed to confirm the contention that even half a century after independence their neighbor has not evolved into a modern nationstate...

...Musharraf has responded to the lukewarm criticism leveled at him by insisting that extreme action was necessary to prevent the country from falling into the hands of the mullahs, as well as to tackle the prospect of bankruptcy...

...That is why Musharraf constantly promises to return to democracy when conditions are right...

...Pakistan has had a General in power for exactly half of the 52 years since it gained independence...

...The House International Relations Committee condemned the coup and called for a ban on all aid to Pakistan, including military assistance...

...Ambassador to Islamabad, William B. Milam, has held Sharif and the Army equally to blame for the blunder in Kargil that led to the coup...

...Because the generals have invariably breathed down the necks of civilian rulers in Pakistan, foreign policy analysts here have been ambivalent about who would be better to deal with...

...The coup, in fact, is said to have been precipitated by Nawaz Sharif's alleged attempt to prevent the aircraft carrying the General back to Karachi from landing there...

...Yet every General has also had to woo the mullahs...

...Meanwhile, for domestic consumption, there is the implication that this was a process Nawaz Sharif was unable to conclude...

...When the Army was forced to withdraw from what is known as the "Line of Control," it was evident that the military had suffered a severe setback...

...The veteran Indian columnist Kuldip Nayar recalls how General Zia once told him that if India wanted to settle differences with Pakistan, it had to negotiate with the Army—democracy would actually make a rapprochement difficult...

...as Secretary of State Madeleine K. Albright has noted, they took place within Kashmir, along the Line of Control...

...The situation is complicated by the fact that few in Pakistan, including civil liberties activists, are shedding tears at Sharif's departure...

...The mixed signals from the United States have not been very helpful either...

...But upon brief reflection almost everyone here recognizes that Pakistan's surrender to military rule for the fourth time in its beleaguered history is no cause for celebration...

...At the same time, it hailed India as a "shining example" of democracy for the rest of Asia to emulate...

...These and other policies have in fact given rise to a strong belief in India that the old American "tilt" toward Pakistan may be resurrected in the days to come...

...THE Bharatiya Janata Party, just re-elected to head a coalition government in India, is still smarting over the fact that even while Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee was engaged in the Lahore peace talks with Nawaz Sharif last year, Pakistan—with Musharraf playing the leading role— was plotting its armed intrusions urto Indian-controlled Kashmir in violation of the cease-fire agreement...