WASHINGTON, March 16: Restoration of democracy in Pakistan is the best antidote to religious extremism threatening the country, says The Washington Post.

In a lead editorial on Sunday, the Post notes that Pakistan is on the verge of taking a major step towards consolidating a centrist, secular democracy.

“The crucial remaining question is whether President Pervez Musharraf and his allies in the Bush administration will allow it to happen?”

The newspaper describes the PPP-PMLN agreement as a ‘potential breakthrough’, which gives them a commanding majority in the parliament.

It notes that Asif Zardari and Nawaz Sharif have both agreed to implement a Charter for Democracy that Benazir Bhutto and Mr Sharif hammered out in 2006 while they were living in exile.

The two leaders, the newspaper adds, also plan to reform the Constitution to eliminate autocratic powers accumulated by Mr Musharraf, including the right to name commanders of the armed forces.

The Post describes the new government’s plan to restore the 63 senior judges ‘illegally fired’ by the Musharraf government as even more important than other intended reforms.

The paper notes that Mr Musharraf sacked the judges to ensure another term as president, but the move was rejected by most Pakistanis.

“The defence of the dismissed judges, some of whom are still under house arrest, and the larger cause of building a genuinely independent judiciary, have become the country’s most popular political movement,” it adds.

“When they are restored to the bench and controls imposed by Mr Musharraf on the media are removed, Pakistan could have the most liberal and open political system in its history.”

This, according to the Post, is the long-term solution to the assault on the country by the extremists who so far this year have carried out 16 suicide bombings and killed more than 500 people – “making Pakistan almost as violent as Iraq”.

But the newspaper considers Mr Musharraf ‘the last obstacle’ to this transformation and notes that he “has clung to the office of president despite the overwhelming repudiation” of his party in general election.

“Retired from the army, Mr Musharraf has one last base of support: the Bush administration, which stubbornly continues to back him,” the Post adds.

The newspaper warns that if Mr Musharraf fails to prevent the new government from restoring the judiciary; he could refuse to recognise parliament’s authority or try to dissolve it after it convenes this week.

“In short, only the personal ambitions of Mr Musharraf, and the Bush administration’s support for them, threaten to disrupt the establishment of a more democratic Pakistan.”

The Post concludes the editorial with an advice: “President Bush … should act on his own principle. He should tell Mr Musharraf either to accept the decisions of the new government and courts, or step down.”