World | Pakistan
PML relieved at hiatus in talks
The ruling Pakistan Muslim League (PML) received with satisfaction the hiatus in deal negotiations between President Pervez Musharraf and former prime minister Benazir Bhutto.
- By Shahid Hussain, Correspondent
- Published: 23:35 September 1, 2007
Islamabad: The ruling Pakistan Muslim League (PML) received with satisfaction the hiatus in deal negotiations between President Pervez Musharraf and former prime minister Benazir Bhutto.
Sources close to PML president Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain said the "serious reservations" conveyed by the party leadership to Musharraf over accepting Benazir's excessive demands prevailed.
Deputy Information Minister Tariq Azim said Benazir had been trying to pretend as if PML and other parties in the ruling coalition "do not exist".
Azim said the former prime minister's statement at a news conference in London where she announced the failure of the negotiations was "replete with hollow slogans and rhetoric".
"The political hype was created by Benazir Bhutto and now she has come down to accept the ground realities that there is a democratic government functioning in Pakistan," the minister said.
The Pakistan Peoples Party chairperson should now "assure acceptance of the ruling coalition led by PML", he added.
Sticking points
The PML leadership insists on re-election of Musharraf in his army chief's uniform, keeping presidential powers to dissolve parliament and government intact and maintaining the bar on a third term for prime ministers.
These were apparently the sticking points that could not be resolved in the negotiations held in London between PPP stalwarts and Musharraf's aides for the past several days in a follow-up to the secret meeting between the military ruler and Benazir in Abu Dhabi in July.
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