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Britain threatens to cut aid

LONDON: After a cautious response to the events in Pakistan, the British government was on Monday preparing to take a tougher stand to put pressure on President Parvez Musharraf to restore democratic rule as quickly as possible.

One of the measures, it was considering, was cutting aid to Islamabad if Gen. Musharraf reneged on his promise to hold the parliamentary elections as scheduled, in January, and to give up his uniform. Foreign Office spokesperson Natasha Khan confirmed to the The Hindu that aid was under review.

“We are considering the implications for our development and other programmes in Pakistan,” she said.

Ms. Khan said the British High Commissioner in Islamabad had met Gen. Musharraf and conveyed to him British government’s concerns.

“He pressed Musharraf to confirm that he would hold elections as scheduled in January and that he would step down as chief of army staff by November 15,” she said.

Officials pointed out that Pakistani Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz’s statement suggesting that the elections could be postponed contradicted the “assurance” Gen. Musharraf gave to British Prime Minister Gordon Brown and American leaders that the Emergency would not affect the election schedule. Over the past three years, Britain has given development aid worth £480 million, a fraction of the U.S. aid during the same period.

Both countries were coordinating their response to the unfolding events in Pakistan.

Commentators portrayed a grim picture of the situation in Pakistan and there were calls for British government to end its support to the Musharraf regime.

“By lining up with a dictator, we give his opponents every reason to resent us, and vindicate the constant anti-Western plaint of ‘double standards’…” The Daily Telegraph said in an editorial headed “Musharraf does not deserve our support.”

The Guardian voiced concern over the west’s impotence in dealing with the events and said: “The general is showing his iron fist, and there is little his western allies can do about it.”

The Times called the Emergency a “desperate move” but argued that Gen. Musharraf was still “best placed” to deliver on the “principal objectives of the outside world in his region” and steer Pakistan towards “political modernisation.”

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