Augustine Anthony
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/ 15 November 2007

Pakistani caretaker government due

Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf is expected to appoint a caretaker government on Thursday to oversee elections he has promised for January but which the opposition say will be a sham under emergency rule. ”We don’t expect fair and free elections under General Musharraf and his mini martial law,” said Farhatullah Babar, an opposition spokesperson.

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/ 9 November 2007

Bhutto under ‘virtual house arrest’

Pakistani police placed opposition leader Benazir Bhutto under virtual house arrest on Friday, a spokesperson said, to stop her from holding her first rally since President Pervez Musharraf imposed emergency rule. A senior official in Islamabad said police had cordoned off Bhutto’s home in the city but only for her protection.

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/ 5 November 2007

Pakistan police use tear gas on lawyers

Pakistan police used tear gas and batons on Monday against lawyers protesting at President Pervez Musharraf’s imposition of emergency rule and detentions mounted, prompting Washington to postpone defence talks. Musharraf cited spiralling militancy and hostile judges to justify Saturday’s action, and slapped reporting curbs on the media.

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/ 5 November 2007

Pakistan police beat lawyers, crackdown continues

Pakistan police baton-charged lawyers protesting against President Pervez Musharraf’s emergency rule on Monday, as police continued to detain his opponents in the face of United States pressure to hold elections in January. Declaring an emergency on Saturday, General Musharraf cited spiralling militancy and hostile judges to justify his action.

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/ 30 October 2007

Suicide bomber kills seven in Pakistan

A suicide attack killed at least seven people, including the bomber, less than a kilometre from Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf’s army residence in Rawalpindi on Tuesday. The attacker blew himself up next to a police checkpoint metres away from the gates to the residence of one of Musharraf’s most senior officers, General Tariq Majid.

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/ 4 September 2007

Bomb blasts in Pakistani city kill, wound dozens

Two bombs exploded in the Pakistani city of Rawalpindi during the morning rush hour on Tuesday, killing 24 people and wounding 66, and at least one of the blasts was caused by a suicide attacker, officials said. The blasts come at a time of deepening political uncertainty in Pakistan, with the army chief and President, General Pervez Musharraf, preparing to try to secure a new term.

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/ 12 July 2007

Pakistanis bury dead from battle for mosque

Pakistanis buried bodies on Thursday from among more than 70 followers of a revolutionary cleric, a day after commandos killed the last few gunmen hiding in the ruins of the Red Mosque. Anger ran deep in tribal parts of north-west Pakistan, though sentiment in most of the country sided with President Pervez Musharraf’s decision to send in the army.

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/ 4 July 2007

Hundreds surrender at Pakistan mosque

About 700 radical Muslim students surrendered at a besieged mosque in the Pakistani capital on Wednesday, but thousands of militants remained inside a day after 16 people were killed. Hundreds of soldiers and police sealed off the mosque and imposed an indefinite curfew in the neighbourhood after Tuesday’s bloodshed.