August 5, 2002	Monday	Jamadi-ul-Awwal 25,1423

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NEW YORK, Aug 4: Former prime minister Benazir Bhutto has reaffirmed her determination to return to Pakistan and participate in the October elections even if she is jailed by “the country’s military dictator.”

In a telephonic interview with the New York Times on Sunday, she said she did not think of losing in the elections, asserting: “I only think of winning.”

Bhutto, who first revealed her decision to return earlier this year in an interview with Dawn, has caught the attention of international media, many of whose members have sought to travel with her to Pakistan when she returns.

The Pakistan People’s Party Chairperson told the NYT that she did not fear returning to the country and would go back in the next few weeks.

“Under the Constitution I can contest the election, and I plan to go back and contest it,” she said. “He is trying to ban my participation in the election because most analysts say my party will win the new elections,” she added, referring to President Gen Musharraf.

As a matter of fact many Pakistani experts and writers believe that Bhutto’s party will get a comfortable majority to head some sort of coalition government in Pakistan.

While she has said time and again that she was willing to share power with military strongman Musharraf, her overtures have been spurned by him.

Besides Bhutto’s convictions in Pakistani courts in absentia, the government has promulgated ordinances which bar anyone for holding prime minister’s office for more than two terms.

While noting noted that Bhutto might simply be bluffing, the NYT, however, said: “But if she does return, her arrival could put General Musharraf and the United States in an awkward position. Her Pakistan People’s Party has been emerging as the most powerful opposition force in the coming elections.”