Pakistani Army Tightens Coup Grip With Military Rule

The army chief of Pakistan declared a state of emergency early today and appointed himself the nation’s leader, just three days after the military ousted and locked up the elected prime minister.

Gen. Pervez Musharraf, who led Tuesday’s bloodless coup against Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, suspended the constitution, abolished national and provincial parliaments, fired scores of high officials nationwide and declared the country to be under military rule.

The decree was broadcast over state television about 2 a.m., and jet fighters could be heard roaring across the skies over this capital.

Musharraf declared that the courts will continue functioning. But he said the Supreme Court will not be allowed to challenge his order and that no court judgment could be made against him. The emergency order made no mention of a return to democracy.

“The whole of Pakistan shall come under the control of the armed forces of Pakistan,” the proclamation said. A copy of the order, which was signed by the general, was shown on television.

Musharraf, who has remained mostly silent since leading the coup, offered no further explanation. He stopped short of declaring martial law, but there seemed little apparent difference.

This morning, the Pakistani people did not seem surprised by Musharraf’s decree, but they expressed skepticism that he will be able to improve conditions in the country.

“We need a leader who can take us out of this crisis,” said schoolteacher Fawad Amjad after emergency rule had been imposed. “We also know that military governments have created problems. I have little hope that this government will be any different from those in the past.”

In Washington, the Clinton administration immediately cut nearly all foreign assistance to the regime, as required by U.S. law when a constitutional government is overthrown by force. The administration previously had refused to label Tuesday’s military takeover a coup.

The decision to reduce aid to Pakistan is largely symbolic because sanctions imposed over the past decade have slashed once lavish U.S. support to about $5 million this year, nearly all of it channeled through nongovernmental groups.

James Foley, a State Department spokesman, said U.S. Ambassador William Milam will meet early today with Musharraf. It will be the U.S. government’s first official contact with the South Asian nation’s new military rulers.

Milam will “try to find out the intentions of the new leadership . . . and to determine exactly what these new provisions entail,” according to another State Department official.

Milam, who was returning to Pakistan early today from Washington, “will give them a very stiff message that we expect a return to civilian government and constitutional processes,” said David Leavy, a White House spokesman. “There has to be a process to achieve that. We will make that very clear.”

Musharraf’s declaration of emergency rule came only two hours after President Clinton appeared at a White House news conference and called for restoration of civilian rule “as quickly as possible.”

“We don’t like it when military leaders forcibly displace elected governments, and we’ve made that clear,” Clinton said.

U.S. officials said Washington was disappointed but not surprised by Musharraf’s predawn move to tighten the military’s grip on power.

“It’s certainly not a positive development,” one official said. “But it certainly doesn’t mean it’s the end of the road and that they still can’t return to civilian government.”

Musharraf launched the coup Tuesday when Sharif tried to force him into early retirement.

Sharif’s ouster was the culmination of growing tension between the two men after Pakistani troops moved into Indian territory last spring. The incursion into the disputed Kashmir region led to a weeks-long border clash that ended only when Sharif, under pressure from Clinton, ordered the Pakistani army to withdraw in July.

The overthrow of Sharif, who has been prime minister since 1997, spread alarm throughout the region and the world. Pakistan has a history of political instability and military rule. It tested nuclear devices last year, as did India, its longtime rival.

Many Pakistanis had come to resent Sharif’s increasingly autocratic regime. Whether they will support the emergency rule, however, was unclear early today.

Musharraf’s emergency order seemed to counter the impression held by many Western diplomats in Pakistan that the general intended to steer the country back toward democracy. On Thursday, Musharraf met with politicians, including Mohammed Rafiq Tarar, who reportedly will continue to hold the largely ceremonial post of president. A presidential spokesman, Irfan Siddiqi, said the general was seeking to restore civilian rule.

For many, the first hint that Musharraf was not heading toward democratic rule came Thursday, when the general ordered his men to seal off the parliament building and send its members home. The soldiers closed the building on the eve of a scheduled meeting of the National Assembly, the lower house. Guards blocked its entrance.

“This does not augur well for the future of Pakistani democracy,” said Naveed Qamar, a member of the National Assembly.

The declaration of an emergency seemed certain to strain Pakistan’s moribund economy, which long has depended on foreign aid and loans to stay afloat. Economists say Pakistan’s battered economy can ill afford further delays in international loans. Its foreign reserves are roughly $1.5 billion, enough to cover only two months of imports for a nation heavily dependent on foreign supplies of even staples such as cooking oil.

Even before the emergency declaration, Musharraf’s silence had begun to provoke uneasiness. On Thursday, the benchmark index of the Karachi Stock Exchange, open for the first time since the coup, dropped 7.4%. Pakistan’s central bank suspended currency trading Thursday to stop the flight of capital from the country.

Over the past three days, Musharraf reportedly has been seeking a legal rationale for the overthrow of Sharif, several observers said. Such a legal nicety would have been unnecessary had Musharraf planned from the beginning to suspend the constitution, they noted.

“The army wants to keep a civilian face,” said Rufad Hussein, a professor of political science at Quaid-i-Azam University here.

Filkins reported from Islamabad and Drogin from Washington.