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Former Pakistani military ruler to face treason charges

Iran Press TV

Fri Jun 28, 2013 5:16AM GMT

Pakistan’s former military ruler Pervez Musharraf is to face treason charges over his role in imposing emergency rule and detaining judges in 2007, Press TV reports.

Pakistan’s Federal Investigation Agency established on Thursday a four-member committee to probe charges that Musharraf committed treason in 2007, when he suspended the constitution by initiating emergency rule and releasing judges.

“The committee has been formed for the investigation of General Pervez Musharraf. He could submit anything that he wants,” said Sheikh Ahsan ud-Din, a lawyer with the Supreme Court of Pakistan.

On June 26, Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif ordered officials to start an investigation into the case of the former Pakistani president.

Sharif said that Musharraf, who is currently under house arrest at his home in the capital, Islamabad, should face trial and “answer his guilt” before the court because his actions came under the “purview of high treason.”

Meanwhile, Musharraf supporters criticized the move as politically motivated, saying it may trigger tensions between the Pakistani government and the army, which supports the former military chief.

“General Musharraf is not responsible either for abrogation or setting aside the constitution or putting the constitution in abeyance, because he was the president of the country and it was his responsibility to see that the fabric of the state remain intact,” said Ahmed Raza Kasuri, Musharraf’s lawyer.

In 1999, Musharraf led a coup that overthrew the administration of Nawaz Sharif.

Musharraf is connected with several other cases against him, including the case of former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto, who was killed in a gun-and-bomb attack on December 27, 2007, as she was leaving an election rally in the city of Rawalpindi.

The former army general, who seized power in a bloodless coup in October 1999, stepped down as president in August 2008, about six months after his allies lost parliamentary elections in February 2008 and the new government threatened to impeach him. A year later, he left the country.

In March 2013, Musharraf returned to Pakistan after nearly four years of self-imposed exile in London and Dubai to run in the May 11 parliamentary elections.

GMA/HSN