Word: musharraf
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...dangers for Musharraf in the events set off by Sept. 11 are everywhere to see, yet there are opportunities too. He has an unprecedented opening before him to remake a failing state into one where extremism might no longer flourish. And he seems determined to take it. For the first time in his short reign, he is directly confronting the religious radicals who shape so much of the country's domestic and foreign policy to a radical agenda. "This is a battle for the heart and soul of Pakistan," says Chris Smith, senior research fellow at King's College London...
...would be used only for logistics, not combat. Although Washington forewarned him, the President will take heat from all sides now that the U.S. has issued a freeze order on the assets of the Rabita Trust, a three-decade-old Pakistan charity reportedly enjoying support from top officials, including Musharraf. The U.S. said Rabita's secretary-general was a founder of bin Laden's al-Qaeda...
...face of it all, Musharraf is moving vigorously to tilt the odds his way. Besides deploying heavy security forces to contain demonstrations, he put three of the most virulent extremist leaders under house arrest. His most significant actions took place inside the army's barracks. He renewed his term as military chief "indefinitely." And he shook out top generals partial to the Taliban or its brand of fierce Islam who might try to undermine his new policies. Just about everyone was taken off guard, only a few hours before the U.S. bombing of Afghanistan began, when Musharraf smoothly purged three...
...premature retirement of trusted friend Lieut. General Mahmoud Ahmad, chief of the formidable Inter-Services Intelligence, or ISI, widely regarded as the country's invisible government. As a staunch patron of pro-Taliban policies, Ahmad is thought to have opposed Pakistan's new alliance with the U.S. Musharraf had reason to fear that segments of the ISI might thwart promised cooperation with U.S. intelligence. And it is said that Musharraf hit the roof when an ISI-linked jihad group devoted to wresting Muslim Kashmir from Indian control took responsibility for a blast in the Indian city of Srinagar two weeks...
Still, the sweep was a decisive consolidation of Musharraf's power and a first step toward reversing more than two decades of Islamization in the 550,000-man army. It's now less likely anyone inside the military can sabotage or ignore Musharraf's pro-Western policies, leaving him freer to pursue his oft-stated goal of transforming Pakistan into a progressive Islamic state...