Musharraf has lost his mind....
He claims he's fighting the war on terror and that the actions he is taking are to prevent Pakistan from falling prey to "terrorists" and extremists. In just the same way as Mugabe recently called his opponents "terrorists".
So who are these radicals that Musharraf has turned on?
Around the country, human rights organizations have been shut down. Musharraf has ordered the arrest of more than a thousand political opponents and lawyers. Some, including the fired head of the Supreme Court, are under house arrest, reports CBS News foreign correspondent Sheila MacVicar. Other have been sent to prison. Streets in the capital are closed off; the route to the Supreme Court is blocked. Independent news media remain silenced. And criticizing the president or the prime minister is now a crime.The Supreme Court were just about to rule on whether Musharraf's recent election was legal, so he has fired the head of the court and placed him under house arrest.
Bush is now in a bind. He wants to avoid an extremist taking over nuclear Pakistan, but his man Musharraf has plainly lost his mind, and the actions he is taking will only increase extremism.
Now, as Musharraf faced his critics at home and abroad, he quoted another president facing a divided nation, Abraham Lincoln. Addressing the Pakistan people on television last night, he briefly spoke in English, appealing directly to America: "Inaction at this moment is suicide for Pakistan and I cannot allow this country to commit suicide."Rice has threatened to withhold US aid to Pakistan, but apart from that it's hard to imagine the US coming down any harder on their ally. They appear to be working on the theory, "better the devil you know".
The general defended his decision with a quote from Lincoln: "By general law life and limb must be protected; yet often a limb must be amputated to save a life." Suspending basic rights and sacking independent-minded judges may buy Musharraf more time in power, but his assumption of emergency powers could ultimately destabilize Pakistan further and embolden Islamic militants.
It's strange that in the war on terror, which Bush has chosen to portray as the exporting of democracy, that he should find himself in bed with a military dictator who has just pulled off his second military coup.While Washington, which has given more than $10bn (£5bn) to Pakistan in the six years since the September 11 attacks, urged General Musharraf not to invoke emergency powers, some observers questioned to what extent this move will genuinely trouble the Bush administration – especially if the suspension is relatively short-lived and parliamentary elections are held sooner rather than later.
Either way, the US has opened itself to serious questions about its policy of supporting General Musharraf at all costs and its willingness to turn a blind eye to some of government's more extreme actions. Ms Rice hinted that while US aid to Pakistan would be reviewed, much of it would almost certainly continue. "Some of the aid that goes to Pakistan is directly related to the counter-terrorism mission," she said, while in the Middle East. "We just have to review the situation."
An estimated 150 lawyers were arrested in Lahore after a pitched battle between police and lawyers who stood on the roof of the High Court throwing stones at the police below. Some of the lawyers had bleeding heads as they were shoved into police vans, and some fainted in the clouds of tear gas.Oh, there will be huffing and puffing, but they won't blow his house down...
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