Musharraf launches comeback bid with new Pakistan party

LONDON - Former Pakistan president Pervez Musharraf vowed Friday to return to politics as he launched a new party in London, where he has spent the past two years in self-imposed exile.

At a packed press conference which at times resembled a rally, the retired general unveiled the All Pakistan Muslim League to contest the next elections in 2013 as a civilian - although he promised to return home before then.

"The time has come to make Pakistan into a progressive, modern Islamic state," Musharraf said, cheered on by dozens of supporters.

He promised a "party of national salvation" to replace the country's current leaders who "do not show any signs of light in the darkness that prevails in Pakistan".

"I think I can give that light," he said.

Asked when he would return home, Musharraf said: "Whatever the dangers, whatever the pitfalls, I will be in Pakistan before the next election."

Musharraf seized power in a bloodless coup in 1999 and stood down in 2008 after a new government led by the party of assassinated former premier Benazir Bhutto threatened to impeach him.

He was replaced by President Asif Ali Zardari, Bhutto's widower.

The 67-year-old former president brushed off suggestions that he would be arrested on treason charges as soon as he sets foot in Pakistan.

"Today there is no case against me in the courts of Pakistan. Whatever cases have been instituted have been done on political grounds. That, I am prepared to face when I get there," he said.

He vowed that if he returned to power, "we will launch a jihad against poverty, illiteracy, hunger and backwardness" and promised to rid the country of the "menace" of corruption and extremism.

He acknowledged the threat from Islamists, who twice tried to kill him when he was in power.

"We have to fight terrorism and extremism until we defeat it," he said, speaking against a backdrop of the white and green Pakistan flag and the new party's logo of a crescent and star, a hawk's head and the words "Pakistan First" in Urdu.

Musharraf said he recognised he had made mistakes in power, especially in his final year in office, without specifying what they were.

"I am aware that there were some decisions that I made that resulted in negative repercussions," he said.

"I take this opportunity to sincerely apologise. I learned lessons from those mistakes and I am sure not to make them again."

Pakistan is on the frontline of the battle against Islamist insurgents on its border with Afghanistan, where NATO and the United States have more than 152,000 troops fighting nine years after the US-led invasion.

Musharraf said he did not have a new approach for fighting the Taliban - who launch attacks in Afghanistan from the Pakistan side of the border - but argued the current strategy was not being properly executed.

"It is not really going to be a new strategy, but the implementation of an existing strategy that is not being fully implemented," he said.

Musharraf warned earlier this week that Pakistan was at risk of a new coup against Zardari, who is struggling with rampant militancy, a crumbling economy and recent devastating floods.

He also called for the army to be given a constitutional role in the turbulent politics of the nuclear-armed nation, which has spent more than half its existence since independence from Britain in 1947 under military rule.

In a BBC interview Friday, Musharraf said the military were the only resort for Pakistani people frustrated with their government.

"We cannot allow Pakistan to disintegrate, that cannot be allowed. No Pakistani will allow that, no Pakistani wants that. So who's the saviour?. The army can do it. Can anyone else do it? No, nobody else can do it," he said.

(AFP) - 1 October 2010