ISLAMABAD, May 1: Top leaders of the Pakistan People’s Party and Pakistan Muslim League-N ended their marathon talks in Dubai on Thursday with an announcement that they had agreed to reinstate the deposed judges through a parliamentary resolution in accordance with the Murree Declaration.

“The reinstatement will take place through a resolution. There is no ambiguity, no doubt about it,” PML-N chief Nawaz Sharif told reporters after the third round of emergency talks with PPP co-chairman Asif Zardari.

Mr Sharif said the talks had “yielded very positive results” and he would give details after discussing the outcome with PML-N office-bearers and MPs at a meeting in Lahore on Friday.

The announcement is the first ray of hope that the ruling coalition will remain intact and the issue of judges’ reinstatement will be amicably resolved.

The optimism was fuelled by the apparent success of the Dubai talks after several days of uncertainty and bickering between the coalition partners and a doomsday scenario painted by opponents of the PPP-PML-N alliance.

Mr Zardari did not talk to the media but PPP spokesman Farhatullah Babar, when contacted in Islamabad, said the talks had “progressed very well” and his party remained committed to the Murree Declaration for reinstating the deposed judges through a resolution.

He said the two sides had agreed that the details of the agreement would be unveiled by Mr Sharif at a news conference in Lahore on Friday.

Mr Babar said the reports of sharp differences between the PPP and PML-N to the point of jeopardising the alliance were “exaggerated and untrue”.

He said the meeting between Mr Zardari and Mr Sharif and their aides in Dubai had sorted out many issues and the alliance partners were on the “same wavelength and on the same page”.

“Not reinstating the judges will amount to legitimising the unconstitutional action of Nov 3, which no democratic party can endorse,” Mr Babar said.

Mr Sharif, who was accompanied by Law Minister Farooq Naek and Prime Minister’s Adviser Rehman Malik of the PPP, said he was “fully satisfied” with the progress made in the talks.

When asked when would the National Assembly session be summoned for tabling the resolution, he said the issue had been discussed in the meeting and he would disclose the decision in Lahore.

Senior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan later told BBC that the process of the judges’ restoration would be completed by the middle of the current month.

Mr Sharif praised Mr Zardari and the PPP team for their positive attitude.

Both Mr Sharif and Mr Babar avoided saying anything about a proposed constitutional package, but sources told Dawn that the two sides had agreed that after the resolution a constitutional package would be introduced under which the tenure of the chief justice might be fixed to a maximum period of five years.

They said the judges who had taken oath under the Provisional Constitution Order (PCO) issued by President Pervez Musharraf after imposing emergency on Nov 3, 2007, were also expected to be retained.

If the constitutional amendment is approved by parliament after the judges’ reinstatement, Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry will remain the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court till 2010.

At the Dubai talks, Mr Zardari led his team which comprised Mr Naek and Mr Malik whereas the PML-N team, comprising Shahbaz Sharif, Chaudhry Nisar, Khwaja Asif and Khwaja Haris, was led by Nawaz Sharif.

PML-N spokesman Siddiqul Farooque told Dawn that the judges would be reinstated through a parliamentary resolution followed by an executive order of the prime minister. He made it clear that that the PCO would not be protected under the garb of the constitutional package, “nor are we going to clip the wings of the judiciary”.