Re: Nawaz Sharif slams Benazir Bhutto over deal
You are spot on!
http://www.dawn.com/2007/07/27/top7.htm
PPP, PML-N accuse each other of violating charter
By Our Reporter
ISLAMABAD, July 26: The gulf between the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) and the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) seems to be widening with both the major components of the Alliance for the Restoration of Democracy (ARD) accusing each other of violating the Charter of Democracy (CoD) and maintaining contacts with the military regime. Some PML-N leaders had been criticising the PPP for maintaining contacts with the regime. The PPP did not deny them, saying that it had been talking to the government for a ‘facilitated transfer to democracy’. But now, for the first time, the PPP has come out with an accusation that PML-N was in secret contacts with the Musharraf regime. Talking to newsmen here on Thursday, People’s Party Parliamentarians Secretary-General Raja Pervez Ashraf asked the PML-N leadership to explain its secret contacts with the present military regime. He said that PML-N leaders had been criticising the PPP for keeping contacts with the military regime. The PPP had many times said that it has not reached an agreement with Gen Musharraf due to differences over the post of the Chief of Army Staff and his re-election from the present assemblies. He said the PML-N leaders during the Multi-Party Conference in London had denied any contacts with the regime.
He, however, said Shahbaz Sharif in an interview with a private TV channel had admitted to contacts with the government as he (Shahbaz) asked Gen Musharraf to heed the advice of the mediator. He claimed that those negotiating from the PML-N side with a senior military official included former federal ministers Ishaq Dar, Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan and former chief of Ehtisab Bureau Saifur Rehman. He said the PPP wanted an explanation as to whether the All Parties Democratic Movement (APDM), which included the MMA, had been formed to please the military regime by weakening the ARD . He said the PML-N was also trying to bring in foreign governments to assure good behaviour from the PML-N side and in this connection former NAB chief Saifur Rehman’s contacts in Qatar as well as PML-N contacts in the Saudi Arabia were well-known by now. He said instead of demanding a facilitation of democracy, the PML-N aides mainly demanded the return to the country of Nawaz Sharif before that of PPP chairperson Benazir Bhutto. Citing media reports, he said the Sharif brothers had also asked the establishment to reduce the exile period of Nawaz Sharif and his family members. He claimed that the Sharif brothers were asking for pardon for the 10-year exile so that they could come back and oppose the PPP as the establishment representatives. The Sharif brothers were presenting themselves as a countervailing force to the establishment to counter the PPP. This was why they were in a hurry to form the APDM to demonstrate that they could counter the PPP.