Use one against the other, the old divide and conquer bit.
"Protests deepen Pakistan's political turmoil" by Stephen Graham, Associated Press | February 27, 2009
ISLAMABAD - Opposition supporters torched cars and stoned buildings yesterday after Pakistan's supreme court barred two of their leaders from elective office, triggering political turmoil. The unrest occurs as the country's pro-Western government faces strong US pressure to crack down on Taliban and Al Qaeda militants and a punishing economic crisis....
And CUI BONO, 'eh?
Just gonna have to get boots on the ground in there like the war-planners have always wanted.
Hundreds of Nawaz Sharif supporters gathered in Rawalpindi, just south of the capital, waving his party's green flags and chanting slogans against the government. Most were peaceful, but some set up barricades of burning tires. They also used rocks to smash the windows of stores and banks on a main shopping street, witnesses said.
My first thought: agent provocateurs.
Also see: Agent Provocateurs Missing at French Protests
A mob also torched four vehicles on the highway linking Islamabad to the Punjab, police officer Ahmed Latif said....
Yesterday, about 20 lawmakers from Sharif's party were herded into police trucks as they gathered for a protest at the Punjab Assembly in the eastern city of Lahore. Police let them clamber out as the crowd swelled with supporters, who swarmed past barriers, banged on the wooden doors of the assembly building and held a mock parliamentary session on the steps....
Now THAT is a PROTEST!!!!!!
Sharif.... has urged his supporters to join mass rallies planned for mid-March by Pakistan's lawyers, whose protests for an independent judiciary undermined Musharraf's long rule.
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LAHORE, Pakistan - With his supporters rioting for a third day, opposition leader Nawaz Sharif blamed Pakistan's government yesterday for the political turmoil set off by a court order barring him from elective office - unrest that he warned could be exploited by Islamic extremists.
Giving his first interview since the ruling Wednesday, Sharif accused President Asif Ali Zardari of "declaring martial law on democracy," a charge echoing the complaints that forced former military ruler Pervez Musharraf to give up the presidency last year.
Sharif's interview with the Associated Press occurred amid a surge of political squabbling that is sure to distract the government of this nuclear-armed country from grappling with the Taliban and Al Qaeda threat spreading from the tribal areas along the frontier with Afghanistan.
So we BETTER GET IN THERE, Amurka!!
Pakistan also is in the middle of a tense time with neighboring India over a deadly militant attack on Mumbai in November, and Sharif said Zardari's pro-Western government isn't going to be able to face any of its key tasks if it continues to wage political war on him....
The political uproar set off by the court ruling against Sharif is lining up influential civic groups led by disgruntled lawyers with Sharif's increasingly popular Pakistan Muslim League against Zardari. It's a confrontation that will also feed worries about military intervention, a frequent result of political turmoil in Pakistan.
And U.S. meddling.
"I think we are heading for some sort of unfortunate situation," Sharif said at his villa near Lahore, without elaborating. "There are a lot of forces - the militants, the extremists - they are all there to take advantage."
Is that ever a RED FLAG or what? Some boom a coming?
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Critics have alleged that Zardari influenced the Supreme Court decision to neutralize Sharif and consolidate the power of his own party, which holds a majority in the national Parliament....
What, power-hungry leaders playing politics? You're kidding, right?
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