ISLAMABAD, Dec 26: The Pakistan People’s Party has decided to stay away from the all parties conference (APC) called by Nawabzada Nasrullah Khan.

In a statement here on Wednesday a PPP spokesman said it had high regard for the Nawabzada and supported the principles of the Alliance for Restoration of Democracy. However, the Party would not sit at the conference with some of the leaders of the religious parties who had been in the forefront to defend Taliban and its associated militancy.

The PPP reaffirmed its commitment to the one point agenda of the ARD and believed that “the way to the future rests in the restoration of the 1973 Constitution without amendments except as provided in Article 238 and 239; holding of free and fair elections immediately; constitution of an independent election commission, a government of national consensus to hold elections; and lifting of ban on political activities.”

“An ideological difference developed in the country where the Jihadi forces were now pitted against the democratic forces with the military regime falling overtly with the forces of freedom and covertly with the theocratic forces”.

The PPP wanted to ensure that the ideological choices in the country could be sustained in public perception. It also wanted to assess the religious parties’ statements in the APC following the fall of Kabul and the promised crackdown by Musharraf regime against some of the militant groups.

The PPP maintained that the political crisis created by the insistence of the Musharraf regime to occupy the total political space by making the prime minister and cabinet subservient to the President, persecuting political opponents and refusing to implement measures for a fair election were worrisome but an alignment of all political forces at this stage was premature.

The party said that the religious parties had refused to condemn the persecution of the PPP leaders since the PPP was overthrown by Jihadi forces in 1996.

It noted that the Musharraf regime had promised to “moderate the Taliban” extradite Osama Bin Laden, and regulate madaris for three years since it seized power in 1999.

“However, the Musharraf regime was playing to the gallery and its inability to act led to the rise of terrorism, the Afghan war and the collapse of Pakistan’s policy of strategic depth”.

The PPP alleged that the present political crisis was created by the Musharraf regime which refused to form an interim government of national consensus in October 1999 and insisted on running the country’s affairs with a “bunch of incompetent individuals some of whom the people rejected three times consecutively in elections”.

The PPP said, the present crisis could end when the “wrong that was done in 1996 by destabilising democracy, was undone by restoring democracy and the elected government of the people, led by the PPP and its allies”.