ISLAMABAD, April 13: The former prime minister and chairperson of the Pakistan People's Party, Benazir Bhutto, has criticized the 23-year sentence handed down to the Opposition leader, Javed Hashmi.

She said Mr Hashmi had every right to raise questions regarding the armed forces or any other issue as a member of parliament. "To sentence Mr Hashmi is to handcuff the members of parliament and prevent them raising issues that they are elected to raise", she added.

Expressing surprise over the punishment to Mr Hashmi for defaming the army, she said intervention of military in the political affairs and the loss of country's prestige through export of nuclear technology were in fact defaming the country.

The former premier said every human being had right to dissent. To punish a human being for dissenting with the ruling party was against the norms of Islam, Constitution of Pakistan and universal human rights declaration.

She said Pakistan was in crisis because of the inability of the ruling elite to understand the importance of freedom of speech, human rights and empowerment of the people in terms of the institutions that served at state expense. She hoped that Mr Hashmi's ordeal would be impartially reviewed in an appeal to the higher judiciary and that he would soon be set free.

A reporter adds: The People's Right Movement also criticized in strongest terms the sentence handed down to the ARD president. " The Movement believes that this sentence smacks of political victimisation of the worst kind, and exposes once and for all the lack of legitimacy associated with the law."