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Pakistan faced with threat of Islamist revolt: No deal with uniformed president: BB

* Former prime minister says she will return with or without deal with Musharraf

LONDON: Former prime minister Benazir Bhutto insisted on Sunday that she would not strike a power-sharing deal with President Pervez Musharraf so long as he remained the army chief.

Speaking to Britain’s Sky News television, Bhutto said she would return from exile to stand in Pakistan’s next general election. “I think the chances right now are pretty good. It’s about 90 percent out of 100 for me to stand in those elections,” she said.

Bhutto has had talks with General Musharraf about a possible return to Pakistan but maintained she had grave reservations about a uniformed president. “It’s very important to deal with who’s there. He is the person there and if we can find a way to get the uniformed presidency out of the picture, we can find a way to get democracy back... we will be looking forward. We’re not there yet.”

She added: “The post of the army chief must be separated from that of the president.”

She said an amendment passed by Musharraf banning a twice-elected prime minister from seeking office a third time was “an issue which is part of the discussion between us”.

“If he doesn’t bring the change, if the people of Pakistan, through their elected representatives wish to lift that ban, they certainly can,” she said. “Former prime minister Nawaz Sharif and I have come to an understanding that we would lift this ban.”

Bhutto also told German newsweekly Focus that she would fight Musharraf before the country’s highest tribunal if he tried to win a new term from the old parliament before new elections are held. “The army must stop governing the country. The military must respect decisions of the government and be held accountable before the parliament,” she said.

“But I will go back regardless of whether the talks with Musharraf are successful or not,” Bhutto said, adding that she would seek protection against prosecution from Pakistani courts.

Asked by Sky why she wanted to return, Bhutto said Pakistan was being threatened by extremists. “... this is more than a struggle for me: this is a struggle for the heart and the soul of Pakistan ... Very critical choices have to be made between the forces of the past and the forces of the future.”

In the Focus interview, Bhutto warned of a looming Islamist revolution mounted from madrassas. “The Red Mosque was just a warm-up for what will happen if the religious schools are not disarmed,” she said.

She added that Islamist extremist leaders were plotting to overthrow Musharraf’s government and had converted madrassas in Pakistani cities into military headquarters with well-stocked arsenals.

She accused Musharraf of adopting an “appeasement policy” toward extremists that had only strengthened them. She admitted that she had made mistakes during her time in office in trying to work with the Taliban to pacify the country. afp

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