November 14, 2007 (LPAC)--U.S. Deputy Secretary of State John Negroponte will be in Islamabad at the end of this week to loosen the logjam developed between Islamabad and Washington. His likely agenda is to get Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf to lift the emergency, shed his uniform, hold elections and somehow bring Washington's and London's latest poodle, Benazir Bhutto, to share power in Islamabad, and thus re-insert democracy in Pakistan.

It is likely that Negroponte will succeed in checking off at least two items in the agenda. President Musharraf has said on Nov. 14 that he would take his army fatigue off and hold elections in mid-January. The other two items of the agenda-- lifting of emergency and inserting Benazir Bhutto to make Pakistan look democratic--are non-negotiable, as far as the Pakistani military is concerned. The reason that the emergency was slapped on Pakistan on Nov.3, was initiated by a demand (a visible demand as such!) of the Pakistani army. They also demanded suspension of the Constitution and sacking of the Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammed Chaudhry. The Corps Commanders (the guys who order the tanks out on the streets of Islamabad and surround the presidential palace at the time a coup is orchestrated) also demanded that the elections be held under the state of emergency. According to an Indian intelligence official, these Corps Commanders were afraid that in the absence of the Emergency, Ms. Bhutto and her followers in the Pakistan People's Party (PPP) might use their considerable money and street power to create political instability if her party did not do well in the elections.