Former Pakistan military ruler Pervez Musharraf dies in Dubai after years in exile

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Updated 05 February 2023
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Former Pakistan military ruler Pervez Musharraf dies in Dubai after years in exile

  • Ex-military dictator was under treatment at a Dubai hospital for amyloidosis, a rare disease
  • Musharraf seized power in a bloodless 1999 coup and ruled Pakistan until 2008

ISLAMABAD: Former Pakistani president and army chief, General (retired) Pervez Musharraf, passed away in Dubai, close family associates confirmed, after years of self-imposed exile in the United Arab Emirates.

Musharraf, 79, was under treatment at a Dubai hospital for amyloidosis, a rare disease, a former close aide of the military ruler and chairman of his All Pakistan Muslim League (APML) party, Dr. Amjad Chaudhry, said.

Chaudhry said the former president had been "seriously sick since 2018." 

"When I last talked to his family about a week back, he was serious and hospitalized,” he added.

“I am in contact with the family for the repatriation of the mortal remains of the former president,” another close aide of the former general, Major General (retired) Rashid Qureshi, told Arab News.

The Pakistani army, navy, and air chiefs and the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff committee (CJCSC) condoled Musharraf's death in a statement to the press.

“CJCSC & Services Chiefs express heartfelt condolences on the sad demise of General Pervez Musharraf,” the statement said. “May Allah bless the departed soul and give strength to the bereaved family.”




A general view of the exterior of the American Hospital Dubai, where former Pakistan President General Pervez Musharraf is believed to have died, in Dubai, United Arab Emirates (UAE), on February 5, 2023. (REUTERS)

Musharraf, the son of a career diplomat, was born in New Delhi in 1943 and migrated to the newly independent Pakistan with his family in 1947. Musharraf joined the army in 1964 and graduated from the Army Command and Staff College in Quetta. He also attended the Royal College of Defence Studies in London and has fought in Pakistan’s 1965 and 1971 wneighboringneighbouring India.

After holding a number of appointments in the army's artillery, infantry, and commando units, Musharraf was appointed army chief by then prime minister Nawaz Sharif in 1998 - a move he would later come to regret when the military ruler ousted Sharif in a bloodless military coup in 1999. Musharraf then served as Pakistan's president from 2001 to 2008.

Following the US invasion of Afghanistan after the September 11 attacks in 2001, Washington sought Pakistan's support in the 'War on Terror,' and Musharraf became a close ally of the then US administration of George Bush. He also won mass appeal in the West through his calls for Muslims to adopt a lifestyle of “enlightened moderation.” He also embraced liberal economic policies during his rule that impressed business leaders, brought in foreign investment and led to annual economic growth of as much as 7.5 percent.

Musharraf ruled as army chief until 2007 when he quit, trading the military post for a second five-year term as president.

He stepped down as president also in 2008 over fears of being impeached by Pakistan’s then ruling coalition. He subsequently left the country but returned in 2013 with the hope of regaining power as a civilian at the ballot box. However, he encountered a slew of criminal charges, and within a year, was barred for life from running for public office.

In 2016, after a travel ban was lifted, Musharraf left for Dubai to seek medical treatment and has since remained there. In 2019, a special court indicted him on treason charges in absentia, which he denied, and eventually sentenced him to death, though the ruling was later overturned by a higher court.

During his years in power, Musharraf saw many moments of tumult.

In 2006, a popular tribal leader from the southwestern province Balochistan was killed in military action ordered by Musharraf, unleashing an armed insurgency that goes on to date. In 2007, he ordered troops to storm a mosque in Islamabad whose clerics and students were calling for the imposition of Shariah law. The siege led to the birth of an indigenous Taliban movement, the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan, which has since led an insurgency against the government in Islamabad and killed tens of thousands in brazen assaults on security, government and civilian targets.

In 2007, Musharraf demanded the resignation of then chief justice of the Supreme Court, unleashing a mass protest movement that massively dented his popularity and started calls for him to step down.

Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, who is the brother of three-time former PM Nawaz whom Musharraf ousted in 1999, condoled over the military ruler's death and "sent prayers for forgiveness of the deceased and patience for the family,” the Prime Minister's Office (PMO) said in a statement.

Among others who condoled were Chairman Senate Muhammad Sadiq Sanjrani, Pakistan Peoples Party Leader Faisal Karim Kundi, and a senior leader of the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI), Chaudhary Fawad Hussain, who was for years in Musharraf's party.

“I have a long association with him and he always considered me his family member,” he said in a video statement. “Many called him a military dictator but Pakistan has never seen better democracy than his tenure.”

“He led Pakistan in very difficult circumstances and made it a pluralist society. He was a very big person, his friends proved to be small.”


Army chief, PM to fund reconstruction of Pakistan mosque damaged by Indian strikes — minister

Updated 51 min 31 sec ago
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Army chief, PM to fund reconstruction of Pakistan mosque damaged by Indian strikes — minister

  • India last week struck multiple Pakistani cities with missiles over an attack in the disputed Kashmir region
  • Four missiles struck a mosque and an adjacent house in Muridke, killing three civilians and injuring two others

KARACHI: Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif and Army Chief General Asim Munir will personally finance the reconstruction of a mosque damaged by an Indian missile strike in the Muridke city of Punjab’s Sheikhupura district, a Pakistani federal minister announced on Monday.
India last week struck multiple Pakistani cities with missiles over an attack in the disputed Kashmir region. The strikes drew a “precise, proportionate” response from Islamabad.
However, four Indian missiles hit a mosque and an adjacent house within a complex in Muridke that New Delhi said belonged to a militant group, an allegation Pakistan has denied.
On Monday, Food Minister Rana Tanveer Hussain, Punjab Chief Minister Maryam Nawaz, Gen Munir and other officials paid a visit to the Government Jamia Ummul Qura Mosque in the eastern Pakistani city.
“Announcing the government’s decision to reconstruct the mosque, he (Hussain) stated that the PM and the army chief have pledged to rebuild the mosque at their personal expense,” the Pakistani Ministry of National Food Security and Research said in a statement.
The Indian strikes had killed three Pakistani civilians and injured two others, according to Pakistani media.
During Monday’s visit, Pakistani officials met with the injured civilians and inquired about their well-being, according to the national food ministry. They announced top-tier medical care along with support for the families of the martyrs.
The visit came as director generals of military operations from India and Pakistan held talks, Reuters reported, following a US-brokered ceasefire that stopped four days of intense drone, missile and artillery fire.
Last week’s hostilities were triggered by a militant attack in Indian-administered Kashmir’s Pahalgam resort town that killed 26 tourists on April 22. New Delhi blamed Pakistan for the assault, Islamabad denied it.
Kashmir has remained a flashpoint between India and Pakistan since their independence in 1947, with both claiming the region in full but ruling it in part. Both countries have fought two of their three wars over the region.


Modi says India has only ‘paused’ military action against Pakistan

Updated 12 May 2025
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Modi says India has only ‘paused’ military action against Pakistan

  • India won’t “tolerate nuclear blackmailing” by Pakistan, would take stern action for any future militant attack, Modi says
  • His comments were the first since Saturday’s understanding between India and Pakistan to stop all military actions

NEW DELHI: Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi said on Monday India has only “paused its military action” against Pakistan and would “retaliate on its own terms” if there is any future militant attack on the country.

His comments were the first since Saturday’s understanding between India and Pakistan to stop all military actions on land, in the air and at the sea in a US-brokered ceasefire. 

The escalating hostilities between the two nuclear-armed rivals after a deadly attack on tourists in Kashmir had threatened regional peace.

“We will be monitoring every step of Pakistan,” Modi said in an address to the nation, adding that India won’t “tolerate nuclear blackmailing” by Pakistan and would take stern action for any future terror attack.

“This is not an era of war, but this is not an era of terrorism either. There should be zero tolerance for terrorism,” Modi said.

The PM’s comments come from as Indian and Pakistani authorities both said Monday there was no firing reported overnight along the heavily militarized region between their countries, the first time in recent days the two nations were not shooting at each other.

“The night remained largely peaceful across Jammu and Kashmir, and other areas along the international border,” the Indian army said in a statement, adding that no incidents had been reported.

Senior military officials from India and Pakistan spoke via a hotline on Monday, the state-run Pakistan Television reported. It gave no details, but the two sides were to assess if the ceasefire was holding and how to ensure its implementation. There were fears it would not hold after they accused each other of violations just hours after it was announced.

Local government officials in Pakistan-administered Kashmir, called Azad Kashmir, reported no incidents of cross-border firing along the Line of Control and said that civilians displaced by recent skirmishes between Pakistani and Indian forces were returning to their homes.

Pakistan’s military spokesperson, Lt. Gen. Ahmad Sharif, said late Sunday that Pakistan remains committed to upholding the ceasefire and will not be the first to violate it.

Soon after the ceasefire announcement on Saturday, Pakistan reopened all of its airports and restored flight operations. India followed up Monday with reopening of all the 32 airports that were shut temporarily across northern and western regions due to the flare up in tensions.

“It’s informed that these airports are now available for civil aircraft operations with immediate effect,” the Airports Authority of India said in a statement.

The militaries of the two countries have been engaged in one of their most serious confrontations in decades since last Wednesday, when India struck targets inside Pakistan it said were affiliated with militants responsible for the massacre of 26 tourists in Indian-controlled Kashmir. The tourists, mostly Indian Hindu men, were brutally killed in front of their families in the meadow town of Pahalgam last month.

India accused Pakistan of backing the militants who carried out the massacre, a charge Islamabad denied. The incident first led to a spat of tit-for-tat diplomatic measures by both the nations, sending their bilateral ties to a near historic low.

The two expelled each other’s diplomats, shut their airspace, land borders, and suspended a crucial water treaty.

After Wednesday’s strikes in Pakistan, both sides exchanged heavy fires along their de facto border in the restive Kashmir region followed by missile and drone strikes into each other’s territories, mainly targeting military installations and air bases. Dozens of civilians were killed on both the sides in heavy shelling, the two countries said.

The Indian military on Sunday for the first time claimed its strikes into Azad Kashmir and Pakistan last week killed more than 100 militants, including prominent leaders.

Lt. Gen. Rajiv Ghai, the director general of India’s military operations, said India’s armed forces struck nine militant infrastructure and training facilities, including sites of the Lashkar-e-Taiba group that India blames for carrying out major militant strikes in India and the disputed region of Kashmir.

Ghai said at least 35 to 40 Pakistani soldiers were killed in clashes along the Line of Control, the de facto border that divides the disputed Kashmir region between India and Pakistan. Five Indian soldiers were also killed, he said.

Pakistan’s Information Minister Attaullah Tarar on Thursday said his country’s armed forces had killed 40 to 50 Indian soldiers along the Line of Control. Pakistani military also claimed to have shot down five Indian fighter jets and inflected heavy losses on Indian military installations by targeting 26 locations in India.

The Associated Press couldn’t independently verify the claims made by India and Pakistan.

Air Chief Marshal AK Bharti, the director general India’s air operations told a news conference on Monday that despite “minor damage (s) incurred, all our military bases and air defense systems continue to remain fully operational, and ready to undertake any further missions, should the need so arise.”

Bharti reiterated that New Delhi’s fight was “with terrorists, and not with Pakistan military or its civilians.”


Trump says used US trade ties to persuade India, Pakistan on ceasefire

Updated 12 May 2025
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Trump says used US trade ties to persuade India, Pakistan on ceasefire

  • India and Pakistan last week used fighter jets, drones, missiles and artillery to attack each other in the worst fighting between them in decades
  • The two countries reached an understanding to stop all military actions on land, in the air and at the sea on Saturday in a US-brokered ceasefire

ISLAMABAD: President Donald Trump said on Monday he had used United States (US) trade ties with India and Pakistan to persuade the nuclear-armed nations to back off from further military confrontation and agree to a ceasefire.
India and Pakistan reached an understanding to stop all military actions on land, in the air and at the sea on Saturday in a US-brokered ceasefire to cease escalating hostilities that had spiraled alarmingly, threatening regional peace.
The two sides used fighter jets, drones, missiles and artillery to attack each other in the worst fighting between them since the 1999 Kargil war, leaving around 70 people dead on both sides of the border.
Speaking at an event at the White House, Trump said the countries ended hostilities for a lot of reasons “but trade is a big one,” adding that Washington was already negotiating a trade deal with India and would soon start negotiating with Pakistan.
“On Saturday, my administration helped broker a full and immediate ceasefire, I think a permanent one, between India and Pakistan, ending a dangerous conflict of two nations with lots of nuclear weapons. They were going at it hard and heavy, and it was seemingly not going to stop,” he said.
“I said, ‘Come on, we are going to do a lot of trade with you guys. Let’s stop it. Let’s stop it. If you stop it, we will do trade, if you don’t stop, we are not going to do any trade.’ People have never really used trade the way I used it.”
While Trump thought his administration had brokered a permanent ceasefire between India and Pakistan, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi said in a Monday evening speech India had only “paused” military action against Pakistan.
Pakistan will have to get rid of its “terrorist infrastructure” if it wants to be “saved,” Modi said in his first comments since the ceasefire.
“I will tell the global community also, if we talk to Pakistan, it will be about terrorism only...it will be about Pakistan-occupied Kashmir,” Modi said, referring to Azad Kashmir.
Pakistan and India have a history of bitter relations and both countries have fought three wars, two of them over the disputed region of Kashmir. Last week’s military conflict between them was also triggered by a militant attack in Indian-administered Kashmir that killed 26 tourists on April 22.
India struck multiple Pakistani cities on Wednesday, blaming the April 22 attack on Pakistan. Islamabad denied any complicity in the assault and reciprocated with similar strikes against Indian military targets.
Modi’s comments came a day after Pakistan said its response to Indian strikes was a “great example” of the coming together of all elements of Pakistan’s national power, warning of a similar response to any future attempts to challenge the country’s sovereignty and integrity.
“No one should have any doubt that whenever our sovereignty would be threatened and territorial integrity violated, the response would be comprehensive, retributive and decisive,” Pakistani military spokesman Lt Gen Ahmed Sharif Chaudhry said at a presser.
On Sunday, Trump also said he would try to work with both India and Pakistan to see if they can resolve their dispute over Kashmir.
“I will work with you both to see if, after a ‘thousand years,’ a solution can be arrived at concerning Kashmir,” Trump wrote on his social media platform, Truth Social, referring to India and Pakistan.
India has for years insisted Kashmir is a bilateral issue and not allowed any third-party mediation.


Pakistan stocks record single-day gain, bonds rally after ceasefire with India, IMF tranche approval

Updated 12 May 2025
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Pakistan stocks record single-day gain, bonds rally after ceasefire with India, IMF tranche approval

  • Pakistan and India last week traded air, ground and drone strikes, leading to aggressive selloffs by investors
  • On Monday, Pakistani rupee marked first gain since the start of May as Pakistan’s dollar bonds rose 5.7 cents

KARACHI: Pakistan’s stocks rose more than 9 percent, the highest single-day gain in decades, and its international bonds rallied on Monday, analysts said, following a ceasefire with India and the approval of $1 billion tranche by the International Monetary Fund (IMF).
The Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX) suffered losses in the last three sessions since India struck multiple Pakistani cities with missiles on Wednesday. Pakistan responded with fighter jet, drone and artillery strikes and four days of conflict between the two sides came to a halt on Saturday evening after the United States announced a surprise ceasefire.
On Monday, the benchmark KSE-100 index rose by 9.45 percent, or 10,123 points, to close at 117, 297 points, compared to Friday’s close of 107,174 points. The country’s currency and international bonds also surged, paring their losses since tensions rose with India over an attack in Indian-administered Kashmir on April 22.
“The highest single-day gain in almost three decades comes after the ceasefire announcement of India and Pakistan,” Shankar Talreja, head of research at Karachi-based Topline Securities brokerage firm, told Arab News.
The KSE-30 index, which includes the top 30 most liquid companies, increased about 9.7 percent during the intraday trade, forcing the bourse to halt trading at 9:37am Pakistan time for an hour.
The geopolitical tensions had led to aggressive selloffs and fueled widespread investor concerns at the bourse which lost more than 12 percent between April 22 and May 8.
Monday’s rally triggered the upper circuit breaker for the second time in the PSX’s history since July 2023, according to Adnan Sami Sheikh, an analyst at Pakistan Qatar Investment Company Ltd. The otherwise risk-averse investors went on a buying frenzy primarily on the back of a US-brokered ceasefire agreement between India and Pakistan.
“Local individual investors who had been net sellers in the recent past were aggressive buyers,” Talreja said, adding that according to Bloomberg-compiled data, PSX had become the world’s third best performing stock index over the last one year.
The other factor behind Monday’s rally was the IMF’s approval of $1.4 billion loan to Pakistan under its climate resilience fund, and the release of a $1 billion as part of the country’s $7 billion bailout program secured in Sept. last year, taking the total disbursements under the program to $2.1 billion, according to analysts.
The much-awaited inflows will boost the cash-strapped nation’s foreign exchange reserves, which Islamabad seeks to increase to $14 billion by June. The IMF, which the once-near-default Islamabad has visited frequently in recent years, wants Pakistan to hold enough dollars for at least three months of imports.
PAKISTANI RUPEE AND BONDS
Pakistan’s currency marked the first gain in the last seven sessions this month and rose 0.1 percent, with the US dollar closing at Rs281.57, according to the State Bank of Pakistan.
The rupee had devalued 0.3 percent since last month, when Pakistan’s now-de-escalating border tensions with India had first resurfaced.
The South Asian nation’s global bonds also rallied sharply and rose as much as 5.7 cents globally, Reuters news agency reported, citing Tradeweb data. Most of the bond maturities have clawed back the losses sustained since April 22.
“The investors are now perceiving lower country risk premium for Pakistan,” Talreja added.
Commenting on the developments, Pakistan’s finance adviser Khurram Schehzad said the South Asian nation has much more to offer.
He said positives like the IMF board’s approval, declining interest rate, spillover effect of a potential settlement of the US-China tariff issue, and Pakistan’s “measured and responsible” response in terms of narrative and the actions on ground against India have caught the attention of investors.
“Renewed investor confidence...enhanced IMF funding and support, renewed regional investor interest, one of the lowest inflation rates and stable currency parities in the region all position Pakistan for a more meaningful economic upside moving forward,” he said.


Four killed in car, gas tanker collision in Pakistan’s northwest

Updated 12 May 2025
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Four killed in car, gas tanker collision in Pakistan’s northwest

  • Road accidents are common in Pakistan, where highways and roads are poorly maintained and traffic laws are widely ignored
  • Last month, a speeding truck carrying laborers, women and children fell into a ravine in Sindh, killing at least 13 people

ISLAMABAD: At least four people were killed on Monday when a car collided with a gas tanker in Pakistan’s northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) province, the provincial rescue service said.
The collision took place in Daraban area of KP’s Dera Ismail Khan district and the deceased included a nine-year-old child, according to a Rescue 1122 spokesperson.
The cause of the accident could not be immediately known.
“Bodies of all those killed were shifted to hospital,” the spokesperson said. “All deceased person hailed from Darazanda tehsil.”
Road accidents are common in Pakistan, where highways and roads are poorly maintained and traffic laws are widely ignored.
Last month, a speeding truck carrying laborers, women and children fell into a ravine in the southern Sindh province, killing at least 13 people and injuring 20 others, police said.
In Dec., at least 18 passengers were killed in two separate road crashes in Pakistan’s eastern Punjab and southern Sindh provinces, authorities said.