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Musharraf's Toughest Critic Softens Stance

A P Kamath in Ottawa

Canada's ultra-liberal and outspoken Foreign Affairs Minister Lloyd Axworthy had emerged the harshest critic of the coup in Pakistan. He had said he did not see any good coming out of the military takeover led by General Pervez Musharraf. He had argued that those who are "whitewashing" the military regime don't see the danger their position could cause.

"Once you begin to accept a 'good coup' versus a 'bad coup', then all of a sudden you give total license for military takeovers around the world,'' Axworthy had insisted. "Any time somebody decides they don't like the civilian government that has been elected, they can come out of the barracks."

But in the last few days, Axworthy is also having a reality check -- and is grudgingly softening some of the demands he has been making before a Commonwealth delegation visits Islamabad. Axworthy said on Friday that he no longer insists on meeting Pakistan's deposed prime minister Nawaz Sharief on a Canadian-led four-nation mission next week.

"We've requested that, but... our condition was that we have access to a wide range of Pakistani society, including opposition politicians who are now under arrest. If we can get access to him, we will," Axworthy said.

He had insisted last week that "one of the primary conditions [of the mission] is that we have to be given full access not just to members of the regime but to other political figures as well, including the former prime minister, and whoever we'd like to talk to."

"I think it's an important condition and if it's not met, we'll have to take another look at it," he said.

Political observers here believe that he changed his mind seeing that the military government would not give in to his demand, and if he insisted on his demands, any opportunity to engage the military in a dialogue would be lost.

Axworthy, a former professor, has a PhD in political science from Princeton University. He has been Canada's foreign minister since January 1996.

Observers here feel that Axworthy, who has assumed a far tougher stance against the military regime than the US government, is also realizing slowly that the coup has proved popular with the Pakistani public because of the corruption and economic decline under Sharief's rule.

But he is unlikely to change his view that the overthrow of a democratic government is unacceptable. Axworthy had played a pivotal role in getting the Commonwealth suspended Pakistan from participating in any of its activities.

The delegation will be in Pakistan on Thursday and Friday next week to press the country's military rulers for a timetable on a return to democratic rule. The other members are Ghana, Barbados and Malaysia.

Axworthy, his associates believe, will still try for a meeting with Sharief, as well as opposition figures and military rulers.

"Part of the problem with the regime is that those who have been arrested have still not been given any... legal process,'' he said.

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