Musharraf Appoints Ally As Caretaker Prime Minister

Pakistan's president, Pervez Musharraf, today appointed a close ally as caretaker prime minister to oversee parliamentary elections in January.

The chairman of the upper house of parliament, Mohammadmian Soomro, will be sworn in to the key position tomorrow. Opposition parties attacked his appointment as another ruse by Musharraf to secure his grip on power.

"We totally reject it. This appointment, in fact, is part of General Musharraf's scheme to perpetuate his rule," said Mushahidullah Khan, the vice president of former prime minister Nawaz Sharif's party.

A caretaker government is required as parliament's five-year term ends today. Musharraf's concurrent presidential mandate also expires today, although the president has extended his rule by declaring a state of emergency that has thrown the country into disarray.

Full details of the new cabinet have yet to be released but Pakistani TV channels said several Musharraf loyalists had been selected.

Meanwhile, the Reuters news agency tonight reported that the government had lifted the house arrest order on Benazir Bhutto.

"The government has withdrawn Bhutto's detention order, and from now, she is free to move wherever she likes," the police chief in Lahore, Aftab Cheema, told Reuters.

The appointment of the new cabinet came as Musharraf's political opponents began discussions on setting up an opposition coalition.

Bhutto called for a national unity government to take over from Musharraf ahead of elections, amid US fears of a power vacuum if he is forced out. Bhutto, who has just returned from self-exile after eight years, told the US consul general in Lahore, Brian Hunt, that she could not work with Musharraf.

"He came to find out whether I could work with Gen Musharraf, and I told him that it was very difficult to work with someone who instead of taking us toward democracy took us back toward military dictatorship," she told the Associated Press.

Bhutto has spoken to another former prime minister, Nawaz Sharif, whose government was ousted by Musharraf in 1999, about a united front, a spokesman for her Pakistan People's party said. "She talked about the need for cooperation by all political parties on a one-point agenda aimed at the restoration of the constitution, lifting of the emergency and holding free and fair elections," Farhatullah Babar told the Associated Press.

Bhutto was placed under house arrest on Tuesday to prevent her from leading anti-Musharraf rallies, and Sharif said he would make another attempt to return to Pakistan. He tried to go back in September but was promptly deported back to Saudi Arabia, where he has been living in exile.

Speaking to GMTV by telephone, he said: "I will certainly make another attempt to return to Pakistan because my country needs me. I am in touch with Benazir Bhutto. She is expressing her desire to come back and we will be very happy to work together and launch a joint struggle against the dictator. It's important for me to go back now."

Sharif described the arrest of the former cricket star Imran Khan as a "very serious matter". Khan, now a politician, was arrested and charged under draconian anti-terror laws. He was one of the few opposition politicians to remain free since Musharraf declared emergency rule on November 3, igniting criticism at home and abroad, and sparking fears about the stability of a nuclear-armed state.

Two boys died today when police and gunmen fired at each other in Karachi during protests by Bhutto supporters. Pakistani police blamed protesters for the "indiscriminate gunfire" that killed two boys, aged 11 and 12, in the first reported deaths since the imposition of emergency rule.

The US, which considers Pakistan a key ally in the "war on terror", urged Musharraf to end the state of emergency and hold elections, a message that was repeated today by Hunt. "We need to move as rapidly as possible to have free and fair elections held on time," the US diplomat said after visiting Bhutto.

The US deputy secretary of state, John Negroponte, who last week warned against cutting aid to an "indispensable" ally, is due to arrive in Pakistan next week to press Musharraf to restore constitutional rule.

Musharraf has said he would step down as army chief and be sworn in as a civilian president as soon as the supreme court, where new judges have been appointed to replace those he regarded as hostile, rule on challenges to his October re-election. The attorney general said the court was expected to reach a ruling around the end of next week.