Musharraf holds on with crackdown on opposition

Police were today holding up to 1,800 opponents of Pakistan’s President Pervez Musharraf in a ruthless crackdown following his declaration of emergency rule.

Non-state media was also silenced as General Musharraf moved to cut off any dissent to his power grab which critics say is a last-ditch attempt to remain in charge.

Gen Musharraf, who is also head of Pakistan’s army, suspended the constitution on Saturday before the country’s Supreme Court could bring in ruling on whether his re-election as president last month was legal.

He removed independent-minded judges, stripped media freedoms and granted sweeping powers to authorities to crush dissent.

Although public anger was mounting in the nation of 160 million people, which has been under military rule for much of its 60-year history, demonstrations so far have been limited largely to activists, rights workers and lawyers. All have been quickly and sometimes brutally stamped out.

Both the US and Britain have called for the return of civilian rule and made noises about cutting off financial aid to the country.

But President George Bush’s top security aides said funding to Pakistan’s anti-terrorism operations would not be affected.

America is pumping billions into the country in return for cooperation against Islamic fanatics such as al Qaida.

Gen Musharraf repeated today that he was committed to complete Pakistan’s transition to democracy, although under the state of emergency elections scheduled for January could be pushed back by up to a year.

His leadership is threatened by the Islamic militant movement that has spread from border regions to the capital, the re-emergence of political rival and former prime minister, Benazir Bhutto, and an increasingly defiant Supreme Court, which has been stripped in the last two days.

Since Saturday up to 1,800 people have been held, an Interior Ministry official said. They include opposition leaders, lawyers and human rights activists who might mobilise protests.

Around 70 of them were workers and supporters of Ms Bhutto, said Pakistan People’s Party spokesman Farhatullah Babar.

Lawyers, who were the driving force behind protests earlier this year when gen Musharraf tried unsuccessfully to fire chief justice Iftikhar Mohammed Chaudhry, attempted to stage rallies in major cities but were beaten and arrested.

Justice Chaudhry was removed from his post on Saturday, just as the Supreme Court was preparing to rule on legal claims that gen Musharraf’s October 6 re-election win should be quashed because he was also head of the army when he stood for office.

In the biggest gathering today about 2,000 lawyers gathered at the High Court in the eastern city of Lahore.

As they tried to leave hundreds of police stormed inside, swinging batons and firing tear gas.

The lawyers responded by throwing stones and beating police with tree branches.

Police bundled about 250 lawyers into waiting vans.

In the capital Islamabad hundreds of police and paramilitary troops lined roads and rolled out barbed-wire barricades to seal off the Supreme Court.

As well as calling for protests, lawyers’ groups have vowed to boycott all court proceedings held in front of new judges sworn by gen Musharraf.

Rana Bhagwandas, a Supreme Court judge who refused to take oath under gen Musharraf’s proclamation of emergency orders, said he has been locked inside in his official residence in Islamabad and that other judges were being pressured to support the government.

“They are still working on some judges, they are under pressure,” he said.

Authorities have imprisoned or put under house arrest key Musharraf critics, among them Javed Hashmi, the acting president of the party of former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif; cricket star-turned politician, Imran Khan; Asma Jehangir, chairman of the independent Human Rights Commission of Pakistan; and Hamid Gul, former chief of the main intelligence agency.

Pakistan’s largest religious party Jamaat-e-Islami reported that more than 500 of its workers and supporters had been detained since yesterday, including its leader.