Pervez Musharraf

I

Introduction

Pervez Musharraf, born in 1943, president of Pakistan who as the army chief of staff seized power after ousting Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif in a bloodless coup on October 12, 1999. In 2001 Musharraf positioned Pakistan as an ally of the United States in its war on terrorism. He retained his military title until November 2007, when he was inaugurated to a new term as a civilian president.

Musharraf was born in 1943 in Delhi, India, and migrated with his family to Karāchi, Pakistan, soon after India and Pakistan gained independence from British rule in 1947. However, he spent most of his early childhood in Turkey where he lived with his family from 1949 to 1956. He was educated at the Pakistan Military Academy and joined the army in 1964, serving in an artillery regiment and later in the commandos. He fought in the wars against India in 1965, when he was awarded a medal for gallantry, and in 1971 over the disputed province of Jammu and Kashmīr. Musharraf was promoted to the rank of general and named army chief of staff in October 1998. See also Indo-Pakistani Wars.

II

Musharraf’s Coup

A dispute between Sharif and Musharraf arose over Sharif’s decision to order the withdrawal of military-backed Islamic militants from Kashmīr. In October 1999, while Musharraf was out of the country, Sharif dismissed the general. However, the military intervened and within two days Musharraf had declared a state of emergency and appointed himself leader. Sharif was subsequently tried and convicted on charges of hijacking and terrorism, and sentenced to life imprisonment. In December 2000 he was allowed to go into exile in Saudi Arabia.

In March 2000 Musharraf announced that local elections lasting six months would begin in December 2000, and he promised general elections soon afterwards. In May 2000 Pakistan’s Supreme Court ruled that Musharraf’s coup had been legal, although it set a three-year limit on military rule.

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On June 20, 2001, Musharraf assumed the office of president of Pakistan. In August he announced a four-phase plan that would culminate with democratic provincial and federal elections in October 2002. The first phase of the plan saw the installation of district governments. In an effort to stem the numerous outbreaks of sectarian violence in Pakistan that had killed hundreds in previous years, Musharraf banned two extremist Islamic groups, the Sunni Muslim group Lashkar-Janghvi and the Shia Muslim group Sipah-e-Mohammed, in August 2001.

III

Musharraf and Terrorism

Following the terrorist attacks on the United States on September 11, 2001, and the buildup to the U.S. military strikes on neighboring Afghanistan, Musharraf abandoned his country’s policy of support for the Taliban regime in Afghanistan and clamped down on Islamist dissent. He became a staunch ally of the United States and American military operations against the Taliban and its al-Qaeda allies, providing military bases and support.

Despite Musharraf’s change in policy toward Islamic terrorists in Afghanistan, relations with neighboring India continued to deteriorate. Kashmīri separatists attacked the Indian parliament in December 2001, and cross-border tensions increased between the two nuclear powers, with the Indian government accusing Pakistan of assisting Islamic insurgents in Kashmīr. In May 2002 Musharraf denied that terrorist groups were crossing into Kashmīr from Pakistan and later rejected an Indian proposal for joint policing of the Kashmīr Line of Control, the de facto border between the two countries. The testing of a ballistic missile capable of carrying nuclear warheads and with a range up to 180 km (110 mi) at the end of May indicated Pakistan’s continued hard line in relations with India, although Musharraf later stated that he would do all he could to prevent infiltration across the Line of Control. The Indian government later acknowledged that there had been a fall in the number of incursions following Musharraf’s statement.

Meanwhile, the international diplomacy that resulted from the standoff between India and Pakistan began to yield results. In May 2003 India and Pakistan restored diplomatic ties. High-level contacts followed. Musharraf offered a cease-fire in Jammu and Kashmīr, and in late November Indian prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee accepted. For the first time in 14 years, artillery fire ceased along the 1,100-km (700-mi) border.

In December 2003 Musharraf survived two attempts on his life. Pakistani authorities believed the attacks were instigated either by al-Qaeda or Islamic extremists within Pakistan or a combination of the two. An audiotape reportedly made by Ayman Muhammad Rabi’ al-Zawahiri, al-Qaeda’s second-in-command after Osama bin Laden, called for Musharraf’s overthrow. The assassination attempts failed to halt Musharraf’s peacemaking efforts with India. In January 2004 India and Pakistan agreed to resume talks on a wide range of issues, including Kashmīr. Musharraf indicated that Pakistan could be flexible on Kashmīr, and he pledged that Pakistan would not allow any territory under its control “to be used to support terrorism in any manner.”

IV

Hold on Power

In April 2002 Musharraf called for a referendum to affirm his seizure of the presidency and to formally extend his term in office for another five years. Musharraf claimed a huge victory in the referendum, which was held the next month, but his opponents challenged the fairness of the vote. In a further move to consolidate his position ahead of the scheduled return to democracy, Musharraf changed the constitution to give the president the power to appoint and remove the prime minister and to dismiss an elected parliament. At the same time Musharraf announced the formation of a National Security Council, headed by the president and including members of the military and an opposition leader, to monitor the performance of future governments. In all, Musharraf unilaterally imposed 29 amendments to the constitution.

The October 2002 elections for the National Assembly gave the greatest number of seats to pro-Musharraf parties, although a higher than expected number of anti-American Islamic candidates also won election. The parliamentary opposition expressed hostility to Musharraf’s continued hold on the position of chief of army staff. In a compromise agreement, the parliament approved a constitutional amendment in December 2003 that ratified most of the powers Musharraf sought. The parliament also agreed to extend Musharraf’s term to 2007. In exchange, Musharraf agreed to step down as army chief by the end of 2004 and promised that the parliament would serve out its five-year term. However, in late 2004 the predominantly pro-Musharraf parliament passed a bill that allowed Musharraf to keep his position as chief of the army through the end of his presidential term in 2007.

Musharraf retained his military title as he stood for reelection, easily winning a second presidential term in October 2007. The Supreme Court of Pakistan agreed to hear challenges to the legality of Musharraf’s reelection. In early November, prior to the court’s ruling on the issue, Musharraf declared emergency rule and suspended the constitution.

Musharraf resigned his military post in late November 2007 and was formally inaugurated as a civilian president. He lifted the state of emergency in mid-December. Parties loyal to Musharraf suffered a crushing defeat in the parliamentary elections held in February 2008.

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