August 25, 2007	Saturday	Sha’aban 11, 1428

PESHAWAR, Aug 24: The Pakistan Muslim League (N) has reiterated that President Gen Pervez Musharraf is not acceptable to democratic forces with or without the military uniform.

Addressing a news conference here on Friday, Anwar Kamal Khan, PML-N leader in the NWFP Assembly, said his party would again request political partied who had not joined the All Pakistan Democratic Movement (APDM) to enter their fold and launch a joint struggle against military rule in the country.

Without naming the Pakistan People’s Party, he said that anybody who would side with the general would be committing suicide.

He said the APDM would not accept the PML (Q) and PPP (Sherpao), as they were part of the military dictatorship.

He said the PML (N)’s central executive committee would meet on Saturday in Islamabad and discuss the political situation emerging out of the Supreme Court verdict in favour of Mian Mohammad Nawaz Sharif and Mian Shahbaz Sharif’s return to Pakistan. He said the committee would chalk out a future line of action and party delegation would also visit Nawaz Sharif in London.

Mr Khan said the PML (N) would discuss the new situation with APDM components and make foolproof arrangements for the return of the Sharif brothers. The committee would decide the date, time and venue of the exiled leaders’ homecoming.

In the past, he said, people of the NWFP had extended political and moral support to Begum Kulsoom Nawaz, when Mr Nawaz had been detained at Attock Fort.

He lashed out at the federal ministers who claimed that Nawaz Sharif and Shahbaz Sharif had abandoned politics and would not return for the next 10 years as they had signed a secret agreement with the military government.

“On one hand, the government says it will accept the Supreme Court verdict, while on the other one of its ministers Sher Afgan has accused the honourable court of a partisan decision,” he said.

He said the government had been unhappy with the Supreme Court when it had scrapped the privatisation of Steel Mills, in which the prime minister himself was involved.

Mr Khan said the military regime had tried to silence the superior courts by filing a reference against the chief justice of Pakistan but the valiant struggle of lawyers, media and political parties restrained the rulers.

A large number of PML (N) workers distributed sweets on the occasion. Some women workers staged a demonstration in support of Mian Nawaz Sharif outside a press club.