Protesters clash with police as Pakistan unrest continues

Riot police clashed with former Pakistan prime minister Benazir Bhutto’s supporters in front of parliament today after she ordered them onto the streets to protest against emergency rule.

In an opening skirmish, 400 loyalists of her Pakistan People’s Party marched up to police blocking their way in Islamabad.

Police fired tear gas over their heads then beat and arrested the few that broke through barricades, including several women.

Naheed Khan, one of Ms Bhutto’s close aides hit a policeman on the shoulder and screamed: “Who are you? How dare you take action against women?”

The demonstrators pulled back through the choking gas, chanting “Benazir! Benazir!” and “Down with the emergency!”

President Pervez Musharraf, who has been promising to restore democracy since seizing power in a 1999 coup, suspended the constitution after assuming emergency powers on Saturday. He has since sacked independent-minded judges, muzzled the media and granted sweeping powers to authorities to crush dissent.

Thousands of people have been rounded up and put in jail or under house arrest.

However, in spite of the demonstrations Ms Bhutto left open the possibility of resuming talks with the president that could see the two join forces in the government, provided he gives in to international pressure to restore plans for January parliamentary elections.

Violent clashes between security forces and Ms Bhutto’s party, Pakistan’s biggest, could dramatically deepen the uncertainty engulfing a country already shaken by rising Islamic militancy.

With the encouragement of the United States, gen Musharraf had held negotiations with Ms Bhutto which paved the way for her return last month following eight years in exile. But her jubilant homecoming was shattered by suicide bombers, who killed more than 140 people.

Gen. Musharraf and Ms Bhutto both say they will toughen Pakistan’s line against Taliban and al-Qaida-linked militants who are spreading their influence in regions near the border with Afghanistan, but with the elections on hold, Ms Bhutto urged her supporters to defy the crackdown by marching on Parliament and attending a mass rally in the nearby city of Rawalpindi on Friday.

She told her supporters to try to reach Rawalpindi “at all costs” to take a stand against a dictatorship she says has fuelled extremism and is destabilising the country of 160 million people.

“We are talking about the future of Pakistan as a modern nation,” she said. “We are talking about its impact on the region, if a nuclear-armed country like Pakistan implodes.”

Rawalpindi’s mayor said police would be out in force to prevent anyone reaching the park where Ms Bhutto hopes to address supporters.

She said her party would stage a 200-mile “long march” from Lahore to Islamabad next Tuesday unless gen Musharraf agrees to step down as head of the military, restore democracy and hold the elections as planned in January.

The United States and other foreign donors to Pakistan are pushing for the same goals.

Pakistani ministers have suggested that the vote could be postponed for up to a year. However, the president of the ruling party expressed optimism today that they could be held as scheduled.

“God willing, it (the emergency) will end as soon as possible and elections will be absolutely on time,” Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain said.

Gen. Musharraf says he suspended the constitution because the courts were hampering his country’s efforts against extremism such as ordering the release of suspects held without charge.

But opponents accuse him of a mounting a last-ditch manoeuvre to stay in power.

Gen. Musharraf sacked the Supreme Court just before it was due to rule on the legality of his contested re-election as president last month.