Bhutto may pull out of negotiations

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan -- Exiled former premier Benazir Bhutto met with party colleagues Friday in London to decide whether to quit negotiating with President Gen. Pervez Musharraf on a power-sharing deal that would end military rule in Pakistan.

Her talks with the increasingly unpopular U.S.-allied leader have been drawing criticism, particularly from her longtime political rival, Nawaz Sharif, another exiled former premier. He vowed Thursday to return home next month to lead opposition to Musharraf.

Musharraf and Bhutto have been wrangling for months over terms of an agreement that would shore up his struggling campaign for a new five-year presidential term and allow her to return to contest parliamentary elections in a bid for a third term as prime minister.

However, the liberal politician has yet to win a public commitment from Musharraf on two critical points -- that he step down as army chief and give up the power to dismiss the government and parliament.

"We would like to know firmly whether the government agrees to our proposals for the transition to democracy or not," Farhatullah Babar, a spokesman for Bhutto's Pakistan People's Party, told The Associated Press in Islamabad as Bhutto's two-day meeting opened in London.

"If we conclude that the talks are leading nowhere, we have a number of options," including breaking them off, Babar said.

In London, party spokesman Wajid Hassan said the party was waiting for written answers to questions raised with Musharraf's officials.

He also said the meeting set a date in October for Bhutto's return to Pakistan. She had previously said only that she would return by December, before parliamentary elections are to be held.

Bhutto is trying to convince skeptics in her own party as well as voters that Musharraf's support within the Pakistani military and international community means he has a role to play in fighting extremism and preventing political chaos that could prompt another round of martial law.

Sharif, however, is adamantly opposed to the man who deposed him in a bloodless coup and has aligned with Islamist parties that voice support for the Taliban and deplore Musharraf's alliance with the United States.

Musharraf, who had governed Pakistan virtually unchallenged since seizing power in 1999, finds himself in a three-way fight for power with Bhutto and Sharif.

The general once vowed not to let either return to Pakistan, accusing them of corruption and mismanaging Pakistan in the 1980s, when each served two truncated terms.

But he has lost support since his botched attempt to fire the country's top judge in March spawned street protests and widespread calls for an end to military rule, leaving him scrambling to find support from other political factions.

Musharraf recently began urging moderates to unite against extremism amid growing pressure from the United States to crack down on the spreading influence of militant Islamic groups linked to the Taliban and al-Qaida.

Sharif, a conservative but like Bhutto a secularist, said Thursday that he would return home Sept. 10 to wage a "decisive battle against dictatorship." He accused Bhutto of breaking an agreement among opposition leaders to fight against prolonging Musharraf's regime.

Bhutto has been pressing Musharraf to step down as military chief as a condition for her support for him staying in power for five more years as a civilian president.

She had named Friday as the day by which her party needed clear concessions if negotiations were to continue, seeking to put pressure on him to give in.

But Musharraf aides responded Thursday by denying her claim that he had decided to quit as army chief before a presidential election by parliament members that is due between Sept. 15 and Oct. 15.

Bhutto's spokesman suggested her party would give government envoys only a little more time to respond or see the tentative deal collapse.

"If they don't come out in a day or two, then I think all the things that have been discussed so far goes haywire," Babar said.

Babar would not say what course the party could take if the talks with Musharraf broke off, but said he was "not optimistic." He said that despite Bhutto's differences with Sharif, she could still join in outright opposition to Musharraf.

Any collapse of the Bhutto-Musharraf talks would likely alarm Pakistan's Western backers, including the United States, which hopes the next government will maintain the alliance against the Taliban and al-Qaida.

Before beginning her talks with party colleagues, Bhutto met with British Foreign Secretary David Miliband.

"We discussed the political situation in Pakistan, including elections, and I was very encouraged that the foreign secretary met me," she told reporters.