May 29, 2007	Tuesday	Jamadi-ul-Awwal 12, 1428

ISLAMABAD, May 28: Chairperson of the Pakistan People’s Party Benazir Bhutto has summoned some of her party leaders to Dubai for a briefing on the upcoming elections by the US Democratic party.

This will be fourth such briefing in about a year’s time.

Sources told Dawn here on Monday that previous briefings were arranged by the International Republican Institute (IRI), a research wing of the ruling Republican party.

They said a team of the National Democratic Institute (NDI) would make a presentation to Ms Bhutto and her party leaders on June 9 on the elections. They said that PPP’s senior vice-chairman Yousuf Raza Gillani, president of the party’s Punjab chapter Makhdoom Shah Mehmood Qureshi, opposition leader in the National Assembly Qasim Zia, PPP’s secretary-general Jahangir Badar, Senator Dr Safdar Abbasi and a member of the party’s foreign liaison committee Palwasha Behram had been ordered to reach Dubai.The sources said the NDI’s presentation would be made by a team headed by the institute’s Pakistan head Sheila Fruman and the NDI would focus on the process of voter registration in Pakistan.

Three similar presentations have been made by the IRI team on the findings of three surveys conducted in Pakistan to ascertain political trends in June 2006, September 2006 and March 2007. The PPP leaders were last briefed by the IRI team on April 29.

Meanwhile, leader of the opposition in the Senate Raza Rabbani in a statement on Monday asserted that Ms Bhutto would return to Pakistan before the elections and participate in the polls.

Responding to an interview by Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz, who claimed that Ms Bhutto could not participate in elections because of several pending cases against her, Mr Rabbani said the cases against Ms Bhutto were politically-motivated and she had not been convicted in a single case despite 10 years of media trial and squandering of taxpayers’ money on tarnishing her image.

Criticising the military rulers, he said the prime minister’s remarks showed that he was merely acting as military rulers’ mouthpiece. Mr Rabbani recalled that Mr Aziz had damaged the country’s position in the world by the published reports of his “disgraceful behaviour with a foreign dignitary” that had not been contradicted despite being widely reported in national and international media. He said Mr Aziz had yet to convince the nation that he was not involved in the stock market crashes, fixing of petroleum prices and the privatisation of Pakistan Steel.