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Pakistan restores eight judges

Eight of the judges sacked last November by former Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf have been reinstated.

They took their oaths at the governor's house in Karachi. Reports say seven or eight more may be sworn in next week.

Mr Musharraf sacked some 60 judges, including Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry, but some were restored later.

Former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif pulled out of the ruling coalition on Monday amid a dispute about how to restore the judges.

Mr Sharif's PML-N party wants all the sacked judges to be reinstated in one go, through an executive order that declares their sacking illegal.

The BBC's M Ilyas Khan in Karachi says the party's views are also supported by a lawyers’ movement that is campaigning for the restoration of the judiciary as it existed on 2 November 2007 – one day before Mr Musharraf introduced emergency rule and sacked the judges.

The leader of the ruling Pakistan People's Party (PPP), Asif Zardari – the husband of assassinated former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto – has promised to restore the judges but under a fresh oath.

Mr Zardari has said the top judge will ultimately get his job back too, but few analysts believe this, reports the BBC's Barbara Plett in Islamabad. They say the government sees him as too willing to challenge the establishment, and too close to the politics of the Muslim League.

Analysts say the reinstatement of judges by the PPP is likely to weaken the lawyers’ movement and raise questions over PML-N's decision to quit the alliance.

BBC News

 

Author

Bilal Qureshi

Bilal Qureshi is a resident of Washington, DC, so it is only natural that he is tremendously interested in politics. He is also fascinated by the relationship between Pakistan, the country of his birth, and the United States of America, his adopted homeland. Therefore, he makes every effort to read major newspapers in Pakistan and what is being said about Washington, while staying fully alert to the analysis and the news being reported in the American press about Pakistan. After finishing graduate school, he started using his free time to write to various papers in Pakistan in an effort to clarify whatever misconceptions he noticed in the press, especially about the United States. This pastime became a passion after his letters were published in Vanity Fair and The New Yorker and his writing became more frequent and longer. Now, he is here, writing a blog about Pakistan managed by Foreign Policy Association.

Areas of Focus:
Taliban; US-Pakistan Relations; Culture and Society

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