WASHINGTON, Oct 5: Gen Pervez Musharraf winning a new term as president will not end Pakistan’s political crisis, says a report released on Friday by the prestigious US Council on Foreign Relations.

The report notes that President Musharraf has received the Supreme Court’s nod to contest while remaining in uniform so long as he sheds it if he wins. He saw off late challenges from two exiled former prime ministers, Washington’s favourite, Benazir Bhutto, and the man he ousted, Nawaz Sharif. To protect his future interests, the general named a loyalist, Lt-Gen Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, the former ISI chief, to succeed him as the nation’s top military officer, the report adds.

“Given that the election is in the hands of the National Assembly plus four provincial parliaments, the opposition’s decision to boycott it virtually assures his re-election.”

But CFR warns that a Musharraf victory does not necessarily translate to stability for Pakistan. “The army is failing in its fight against Al Qaeda and Taliban forces, who have aggressively expanded their influence and operations in the tribal border areas, pushing large parts of the country beyond government control,” the report claims.

According to CFR, Pakistan’s army, like its population, is deeply divided over the ‘war on terror’.

“This is not our war; Taliban, Al Qaeda are not criminals in our country,” a major from the Pakistani army told the Atlantic, the report notes.

Selig S. Harrison, a South Asia expert at the Centre for International Policy, warns of a ‘radical Pashtunistan’ should events deteriorate further. Others, citing the nuclear-armed country’s miserable educational system, its faltering financial institutions and an economy which cannot keep pace with population growth, fear worse, the report adds.

CFR warns that unpopular views of the war on terror, already rampant in Pakistan’s ISI, which helped create and fuel the Taliban movement during the 1990s, may be even more widely held among the general public.

A new survey conducted by Washington-based research institute Terror Free Tomorrow shows that 46 per cent of Pakistanis hold a favourable view of Osama bin Laden. Musharraf and United States remain very unpopular in the country.

In the survey, Ms Bhutto scores highest in the popularity poll (with 63 per cent favourable), and analysts assume Washington sees her as the best way to secure a smooth transition to democracy.