ISLAMABAD, Sept 10: Former prime minister Nawaz Sharif, who was deported to Saudi Arabia in a dramatic turn of events on Monday, will be made to fulfil all requirements of the original agreement he had signed with the government in December 2000. He will have to live in Saudi Arabia for the remaining three years and will not be allowed to take part in any political activity.
This assurance was given to President Pervez Musharraf by Saudi Prince Muqrin bin Abdul Aziz and Lebanese leader Saad Al-Hariri who had held a three-hour meeting with the president on Saturday, diplomatic sources said.
The deportation plan was first considered and then given a go-ahead in the high-profile meeting. The two dignitaries also addressed a press conference the same day and urged the Sharif brothers to abide by the agreement and stay out of Pakistan for 10 years. They agreed with Gen Musharraf not only to accept Sharifs’ stay in Saudi Arabia but also keep them under strict security cordon and monitor their activities and movements, the sources said.
“Prince Muqrin, who is also intelligence chief of Saudi Arabia, and Mr Hariri will oversee the implementation of the agreement,” they said.
Under the arrangements, Nawaz Sharif will have to surrender his travel documents and will be bound to stay in Saudi Arabia for three years.
The sources said that the decision to deport Nawaz Sharif to Saudi Arabia had the blessings of the United State as Assistant Secretary of State Richard Boucher, who met Gen Musharraf after Nawaz Sharif’s announcement of returning home in Islamabad, had already held a meting with PPP chairperson Benazir Bhutto in Dubai.
The sources said that the main objective of Mr Sharif’s deportation was to pave the way for a power-sharing deal between Gen Musharraf and Benazir Bhutto and the latter’s return to Pakistan.
President House sources claimed that the deportation plan had been handled by the interior ministry and President Musharraf played no direct role in its execution.
However, officials said the plan devised by the security agencies on the orders of Gen Musharraf was kept secret. “The president kept the deportation plan so secret that he did not disclose it even to Attorney-General of Pakistan Malik Abdul Qayyum who met him on Sunday evening,” they added.
The attorney-general in a TV interview on Monday said that he had not been taken into confidence on the deportation plan.
The government functionaries also remained in dark or they refrained from disclosing the plan under the directive of the authorities concerned.
Interestingly, most of the senior government leaders, including PML president Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain, seemed least perturbed at Nawaz Sharif’s plan to return home. Information Minister Mohammad Ali Durrani also left doubts about the real plan by saying that all three options -- deportation, arrest or setting him free – had been under consideration of the government.
