Musharraf Appeals for Unity As Calls for Impeachment Grow

President Pervez Musharraf of Pakistan today appealed for reconciliation as he faced growing calls for his impeachment from a coalition government.

In his first public comments since the government announced plans to impeach him last week, Musharraf did not refer to the political pressure to unseat him, but confined himself to general remarks calling for unity to deal with Islamist militants and problems with the economy.

"If we want to put our economy on the right track and fight terrorism then we need political stability. Unless we bring political stability, I think we can't fight them properly," Musharraf said.

Despite the calls for unity, coalition government officials said they were pressing ahead with preparations for impeachment if Musharraf refused to resign. Speaking just after midnight, when Pakistan marked the anniversary of its creation in 1947 upon the partition of British-ruled India, the Pakistani leader said differences should be buried.

In his own independence day address, the prime minister, Yousaf Raza Gilani, a senior leader of the Pakistan People's Party (PPP) – formerly led by the assassinated Benazir Bhutto – also spoke about reconciliation but made clear that this process did not include Musharraf, who took power in a 1999 coup.

"The era of repression is over for ever. Dictatorship has become a tale of the past," Gilani said.

A PPP spokesman, Farhatullah Babar, who is also on a team preparing impeachment charges, said Musharraf had to go.

"For political reconciliation, General Musharraf has to quit. Reconciliation is not possible without it," Babar was quoted by Reuters as saying. "The impeachment process ... is on the right track."

Gilani also spoke about the campaign against militancy, saying the problem had to be faced.

"The war against extremism and terrorism is a war for our own survival," he said.

Shortly before noisy independence day celebrations began, a suicide bomb attack on police killed seven people in the eastern city of Lahore.

British and American diplomats are attempting to find an exit for Musharraf, a staunch western ally, before he is dragged through a humiliating impeachment process.

Rumours that Musharraf is set to quit have been circulating in Pakistan for several days. He has suffered a collapse in support as three of Pakistan's four provincial parliaments have passed resolutions, with overwhelming backing, declaring him unfit for office. The fourth province is expected to follow soon.

The provincial votes were symbolic, but the formal process will begin early next week with an impeachment motion in the national parliament. It is clear that the ruling coalition now has the two-thirds majority needed to impeach him.

Government insiders said that if Musharraf wants to quit, he must do so before the impeachment proceedings begin, leaving him with only a few days.

His spokesman has rebutted any suggestion that he will step down.

Western diplomats have sought to convince the coalition government that impeachment would further undermine the security and political situation in crisis-racked Pakistan, and that he should instead be offered a "graceful exit".

"We're being told [by western envoys] that it's not going to bring more stability to have a long trial. And that it is in the interests of stability for him to exit," said one senior coalition politician.

Sir Mark Lyall Grant, director of political affairs at the British Foreign Office, currently in Pakistan, is said to be spearheading the message of caution. Lyall Grant met Asif Zardari, leader of the PPP, one of the two big parties in the coalition, on Tuesday night at the British high commission. He held a separate meeting with Sherry Rehman, a senior minister, and he also saw Musharraf, the FCO confirmed.

Lyall Grant, a former British high commissioner to Pakistan, was involved in western-mediated negotiations last year between Musharraf and former prime minister Benazir Bhutto, which presaged her return to Pakistan and the holding of elections.

American diplomats are also engaged in an intensive round of meetings. The deputy US ambassador, Peter Bodde, is understood to have met Zardari in the last couple of days. American ambassador Anne Patterson saw Nisar Ali Khan, a senior member of Nawaz Sharif's party, the Pakistan Muslim League-N, the other main group in the coalition. Sources in Sharif's party said her message was: "Give Musharraf safe passage."

However, spokesmen for both the British and US missions denied that they were seeking to interfere. Aidan Liddle, a spokesman for the British embassy, said: "We are very clear that we have no role to play in this impeachment process. Britain has no interest in talking about the fate of individuals."

Musharraf has been a crucial partner in the so-called "war on terror". US officials in particular are anxious that he is not disgraced now.

They are also concerned that impeachment of Musharraf, a former army chief, will poison relations between the government and Pakistan's powerful military.