Word: sharif
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...lean on the judges to rule against his rivals. "The federal government has nothing to do with the Supreme Court's decision, but we commiserate," says Farahnaz Ispahani, a presidential spokeswoman. "This is not what we sought from our policy of reconciliation." The charges against the Sharifs, she adds, were not introduced by the present government but by former President Pervez Musharraf, after he toppled Nawaz Sharif in a bloodless coup in 1999. (One of the charges that led to Sharif's disqualification was his alleged role in the 1999 hijacking of a plane bearing Musharraf, then head...
...hastily arranged press conference at his sprawling home on the outskirts of Lahore, Nawaz Sharif raised the political temperature with a fiery attack on Zardari. "The nation should rise against this unconstitutional decision and this villainous act of Zardari," he said, his face swollen with rage. In a sign that the country was returning to the politics of the 1990s - a period when four civilian governments collapsed in the span of a decade - the former Prime Minister resurrected accusations of corruption. "Where are those millions of dollars?" Sharif asked in reference to allegations that Zardari salted away the spoils...
...showdown between Zardari and the Sharifs had been brewing since the PML-N broke away from the ruling coalition following a dispute over the restoration of judges sacked by Musharraf. Zardari had agreed to reinstate Iftikhar Chaudhry, the deposed Chief Justice who became a symbol of the lawyer-led movement against Musharraf's dictatorship but then backtracked once the military ruler left office. Nawaz Sharif had since been quietly positioning himself as an alternative to the PPP, even as Zardari struggled to contend with the pressures of a souring economy, rising militancy and a diplomatic standoff with India...
...court's ruling is likely to feed support for the upcoming lawyer-led "long march," scheduled in two weeks. Sharif and smaller opposition groups maintain that Chaudhry is the rightful Chief Justice and should be reinstated immediately. The ruling coalition argues that he is "too politicized" to return to office. And while the opposition says it has no wish to derail Pakistan's fledgling democracy, critics fear that street protests could tip the country into deeper chaos, or even invite military intervention. Pakistan's armed forces have always been the country's ultimate power broker, if not its true center...
Political turmoil will prove a major distraction from Pakistan's faltering fight against Islamic militancy. At a time when the government should be focused on staunching Taliban insurgencies in the northwest, it will now be trying to secure control of Punjab. Javeed believes that the younger Sharif's ejection from the province may prove to be a setback for the entire country. "You can disagree with his very strong style of governance," the commentator says. "But with a growing presence of the Taliban in the south, he was playing a role in stopping their spread. Now there is a vacuum...