Pro-democracy group to protest at Musharraf’s arrival in US

Staff Report

WASHINGTON: The Pakistan-USA Freedom Forum, a dissident group of pro-democracy Pakistani-Americans, said on Saturday it planned to mount a protest demonstration when President Pervez Musharraf visits New York next month to address the UN General Assembly.

Comrade Shahid, a spokesman for the group, said the demonstration and public meeting would demand the restoration of full civilian and democratic rule in Pakistan and the honourable return of the army to the barracks where it belonged. He said it was a pity that the Musharraf government which had taken office in the name of accountability, had strayed form that path.

He also decried the induction of army personnel in every walk of life in Pakistan, arguing that it could only weaken the army as the duties so many of its officers had been assigned to perform had nothing to do with the physical defence of Pakistan and its frontiers, the only function that the armed forces should carry out. Comrade Shahid said the protest meeting would also demand that the United States pull out its forces from Iraq and all Muslim regions.

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