Pakistani dissenters return to posts

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan - The party of ex-Premier Nawaz Sharif said yesterday that it would rejoin the cabinet, a gesture of solidarity now that the bickering coalition partners have agreed to seek President Pervez Musharraf's impeachment.

The decision came as Musharraf allies warned they would not make it easy to push out the president, while some newspapers suggested the former army strongman should resign to spare the country another messy political fight.

Musharraf dominated Pakistan for eight years and became a close U.S. ally after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, but ceded control of the powerful army last year and has been largely sidelined since coalition parties trounced his allies in February parliamentary elections.

His fate, however, has been a key focus of contention between the two main parties in the coalition. Disagreements over his future and how to restore a group of judges he fired last year prompted Sharif to pull his ministers from the cabinet in May.

Yesterday, Sharif party officials said four of the nine ministers who had left would rejoin the cabinet in a goodwill gesture.

Though deeply disliked by many Pakistanis, Musharraf has insisted he will serve out the five-year term he was elected to in a contentious parliamentary vote in October, and has shown no signs of giving up without a fight after the impeachment plans were announced Thursday.

"This decision about President Musharraf's impeachment is going to open a Pandora's box," Mushahid Hussain, a senior figure in the main pro-Musharraf party, told the Associated Press yesterday. "It is not going to be that easy."

Hussain insisted his party would defend the president, while another Musharraf ally, Tariq Azim, said the coalition could expect "many legal challenges."

Leading newspapers suggested the president should resign to avoid becoming the first Pakistani president to be impeached. The Nation newspaper said a voluntary resignation would "save the country a lot of trouble."

Analysts say the ruling coalition, which has struggled with pressing economic and security problems it inherited, is not assured of victory. It requires a two-thirds majority of lawmakers to vote for removal in a joint session of both houses of Parliament, and the coalition's total is just shy of the seats needed to win.

The coalition's decision followed marathon negotiations between Asif Ali Zardari, head of the largest coalition party, and Sharif, who was ousted as prime minister in Musharraf's 1999 coup. Officials said yesterday that the process of impeachment could start as early as next week.

Musharraf supporters accused the coalition of trying to deflect attention from its failure during more than four months in power to address mounting economic and security problems.

Inflation in Pakistan is running at more than 20 percent, and the country suffers hours of power outages daily. Food prices have soared. Worries over Islamic extremism are deepening.

Musharraf has the constitutional power as president to dissolve Parliament, yet a move to do so now would be hugely controversial and would require the backing of a military trying to distance itself from politics.

The army has lost public support because of its association with Musharraf and its U.S.-backed military operations against Islamic militants inside Pakistan.

Top Bush administration

officials are pressing the president to direct U.S. troops in Afghanistan to be more aggressive in pursuing militants into Pakistan on foot as part of a proposed radical shift in regional counterterror strategy.

Senior intelligence

and military aides want President Bush to give American soldiers greater flexibility to operate against al-Qaeda and Taliban fighters who cross the border from Pakistan's lawless tribal border area to conduct attacks inside Afghanistan, officials say.

The plan could include

sending U.S. special-forces teams into the border tribal areas to hit high-value targets, according to an intelligence official with knowledge of the plan.

Such a move

would be controversial, in part because of Pakistani opposition to U.S. incursions.

Senior members

of Bush's national security team met last week at the White House to discuss the recommendations and are now weighing how to proceed, the officials said.

- Associated Press