The World - News from July 11, 1989

Pakistan will rejoin the British Commonwealth within the next three months, 17 years after Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto’s father took the country out of the group, Pakistan’s ambassador to London said. Shaharyar Khan said the Commonwealth secretary general, Shridath Ramphal, told Bhutto during talks in London that there is unanimous agreement within the group that Pakistan should rejoin. Pakistan is expected to take up the issue before the Commonwealth summit in Malaysia in October. “Except for the formalities, we are members,” Khan said. Bhutto’s father, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, broke with the Commonwealth in 1972 after leading members recognized the breakaway state of Bangladesh, formerly East Pakistan.