ISLAMABAD, Jan 17: Pakistan People's Party (PPP) Chairperson Benazir Bhutto has asked the regime to keep the armed forces out of politics.

In a statement issued here on Monday, Ms Bhutto took note of a recent New York-based Human Rights Watch (HRW) report which accused the military of having "acted with increasing impunity to enforce its writ on the state and to protect its grip of economic resources, especially land."

She said reports of the military's encroachment on lands, job and economic resources had reached a stage where it was bringing insecurity and criticism. She said patronage in the civil sector had ended and it was time for the armed forces to follow suit to prevent criticism.

She called for a review of policies which enabled the armed forces to take over land and shrinking economic opportunities at the cost of the teeming millions of poverty-stricken Pakistanis.

"Such policies have begun to attract the critical notice of concerned citizens and international bodies and tomorrow it could bring demoralization which was not in the national interest," she said.

Parliamentary questions have revealed that A-1 category of military lands, which are given to the military for specific defence purposes, had been converted into golf courses, petrol pumps, housing schemes and commercial plazas, the statement added. It said the auditor-general of Pakistan had cited serious violations of rules in conversion of A-1 military lands into golf courses and housing schemes.