I'm surprised there hasn't been a thread on this yet--it's getting on the brink of all hell breaking loose over there.

Looks like they want to make Benazir Bhutto the next Aung San Suu Kyi

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20071109/ap_ ... s/pakistan

Bhutto under house arrest in Pakistan

By ZARAR KHAN, Associated Press Writer 1 hour, 7 minutes ago

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan - Pakistani police placed opposition leader Benazir Bhutto under house arrest Friday, uncoiling barbed wire in front of her Islamabad villa, and reportedly rounding up thousands of her supporters to block a mass protest against emergency rule.

The United States called for the restrictions on Bhutto to be lifted, saying it was "crucial for Pakistan's future that moderate political forces work together to bring Pakistan back on the path to democracy." A government spokesman promised she would be free by Saturday.

Bhutto twice tried to leave in her car on Friday, telling police: "Do not raise hands on women. You are Muslims. This is un-Islamic." They responded by blocking her way with an armored vehicle.

The former prime minister had planned to defy a ban on political gatherings and address a rally in nearby Rawalpindi, where police used tear gas and batons to chase off hundreds of supporters who staged wildcat protests and hurled stones. More than 100 were arrested.

The city mayor said they had reports suicide bombers might attack the rally. Deputy Information Minister Tariq Azim said there was a restraining order against Bhutto, telling her to stay at her Islamabad home and not proceed to Rawalpindi because of the security threat.

"I expect that (the order) is all over by now," Azim told The Associated Press. "She will be free to move tomorrow."

President Gen. Pervez Musharraf came under increased pressure from his chief international supporter, the United States.

"We remain concerned about the continued state of emergency and curtailment of basic freedoms, and urge Pakistani authorities to quickly return to constitutional order and democratic norms," Gordon Johndroe, a spokesman for the National Security Council said in a statement. "Former Prime Minister Bhutto and other political party members must be permitted freedom of movement and all protesters released."

Defense Secretary Robert Gates, speaking to reporters earlier Friday on his plane en route home from a weeklong visit to Asia, said he was concerned Musharraf's emergency declaration and the protests and arrests that it spawned could affect operations in Afghanistan.

"The concern I have is that the longer the internal problems continue, the more distracted the Pakistani army and security services will be in terms of the internal situation rather than focusing on the terrorist threat in the frontier area," said Gates.

Further afield, a suicide bombing at a government minister's home in the northwestern city of Peshawar killed four people. Minister for Political Affairs Amir Muqam was unhurt.

The attack underscored the threat posed by religious extremists in this Islamic nation that Musharraf and Bhutto are sparring over. It was cited by Musharraf as the primary reason for imposing the state of emergency last Saturday.

But most of the thousands of people rounded up countrywide since have been moderates – lawyers and activists from secular opposition parties, such as Bhutto's Pakistan People's Party. The mass detentions have fueled criticism that Musharraf – who seized power in a 1999 coup – declared the emergency to maintain his own grip on power.

Friday's crackdown showed that Musharraf was not letting up on his political rivals, despite saying a day earlier that parliamentary elections would go ahead by mid-February, just a month later than originally planned. His announcement came after intense U.S. pressure.

But the crackdown further dimmed prospects that Bhutto and Musharraf would soon form an alliance, which Washington has pushed for, against Islamic extremists.

Speaking to a few dozen supporters inside the barricades after her second foiled attempt to escape, Bhutto said that "we suspended our negotiations" with Musharraf after the emergency was imposed. She also repeated demands that Musharraf step down as army chief by next week, when his presidential term expires.

Musharraf's popularity has plummeted this year amid growing resentment of military rule and his government's failure to curb Taliban and al-Qaida militants.

Outside Bhutto's house scores of police, some in riot gear, monitored her supporters, who repeatedly tried to remove barbed wire and steel and concrete barriers.

At least 30 Bhutto supporters were arrested, including a woman who showed up with flowers. An old bearded man who showed up with a sharp machete and a goat he planned to sacrifice to bring Bhutto good luck was simply shooed away by police.

There was confusion over whether authorities had served Bhutto with a formal detention order. Officials said they had, but Bhutto's aides said they had not received it – and would not accept it. An intelligence official, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to media, said Bhutto was ordered detained for 30 days, but Azim denied that.

After being turned back twice, Bhutto delivered an address heard by reporters on the other side of the barricades.

"I want to tell you to have courage because this battle is against dictatorship and it will be won by the people," she told her followers.

Her supporters said they would only be further emboldened by Friday's clampdown.

"We are going to besiege" Islamabad, said Abida Hussain, a former ambassador to the United States. "Our party activists have been mobilized to move out and take to the streets."

Authorities appeared determined to stop them. Bhutto's Pakistan People's Party, or PPP, claimed Friday that 5,000 of its supporters had been arrested in the last three days across the eastern province of Punjab. But security officials said only 1,100 had been detained.

In Rawalpindi, the normally bustling city near Islamabad where Bhutto had planned to hold her rally Friday, hundreds of police – some on horseback, motorcycles or in armored vehicles – kept a tight grip on the largely empty streets and moved fast against any hint of protest.

Rawalpindi's mayor had earlier in the day warned of a "credible report" that six or seven bombers were preparing a repeat of last month's attack of Bhutto's jubilant homecoming procession in the southern city of Karachi after eight years of exile. She escaped unharmed, but more than 145 people died in the attack, blamed on Islamic militants.

Rawalpindi has also been hit by a series of suicide attacks, targeting the military.

There were also scattered protests in Peshawar and Karachi, where opposition supporters blocked some roads with burning tires.

Musharraf's done a delicate balancing act since 9/11 but his time seems to be closing. Regarding the US calls for open election it's a clear case of the old saying "be careful what you wish for" as I don't see the winner of an election being pro-American. The Taliban seems to be growing stonger in the hinderlands of Pakistan moreso than Afghanistan.
Oh yeah, and we know they have nuclear weapons. There could well be a dangerous and scary situation a brewing. Probably more pressing than Iran in the big picture.

It most certainly is. Will the US make the mistake again of invading the wrong country again, the one with the lesser security threat?

How corrupt is Bhutto? Were the charges against her trumped up or is she seriously compromised?

She was convicted of money laundering in Switzerland, and the gov'ts of France and Poland have evidence agaisnt her as well. Not only that, but it was her goverment that ensured the Taliban's takeover of Afghanistan, so I really fail to see why she's being set up as some kind of positive alternative to Musharraf.

Maybe they think she's the only candidate with sufficient support to get more votes than Islamists, I dunno. Sucks for the people of Pakistan though, their choices currently seem to be: military dictatorship, corrupt democracy, or anarcy.

I sincerely have a bad feeling and little hope.

This is going to end badly and with nuclear weapons.

Their politics is about as predictable as their cricket team

The same can be said for most of the non-Western world.

But some people have the option for one of several corrupt leaders, who are at least nominally democratic.

Yeah, but at least our leaders haven't given support to Islamic Extrem...oh wait.

Well, at least we didn't give aid to the Tali...shit.

True, but I have often wondered if some type of dictator is what is required to establish the basic freedoms and property rights the west often attempts to force upon the third world.

A dictator should be free to force through economic reforms that are necessary for long term growth, like Pinochet in Chile. Most dictators however, are neither benevolent nor terribly interested in long term economics, such a Burma, where you have both a lack of jobs and a lack of basic freedoms. Repressive dictators are one thing, but inept repressive dictators are a whole 'nother story.

You do realize that though Musharraf has been pro-American to some extent, he has shown just about as much support for al-Qaeda, right? That's not saying Bhutto is really any better considering her previous corruption, but at least her camp isn't setting up terrorist attacks to kill the opposition. Either way, it's hard to say how Pakistani politics are going to go while we, the U.S., have really dropped the ball on this one. It was like we had no clue anything like this was going to happen.

It's fuckin mental.

Care to back this one up?

Its generally accepted that a significant percentage of the Pakistani Officer Corps has sympathies for the Taliban and their Islamist buddies. Additionally, Pakistan has significant Islamist political parties, which tend to represent the tribal areas, and even if he personally does not give active support to the Taliban and their ilk, his balancing act requires him to give them freer reign than the west would like. There was an Oped piece in the Times last week or so discussing that the Pakistani military was going through a period of Islamification when Musharaff and the current senior officers were just entering the military, and that effect is still being felt.

it's unfortunate that america's interest in afghanistan will probably impede the correct course of action here. they don't like what is going on, but they're even more concerned about who the replacement might be

That's what Bush said.