Police, lawyers clash
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — Pakistan's deposed chief justice called on lawyers nationwide today to defy baton-wielding police and protest President Gen. Pervez Musharraf's imposition of emergency rule.
"Go to every corner of Pakistan and give the message that this is the time to sacrifice," Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry, who is under virtual house arrest in Islamabad, told lawyers by mobile phone. "Don't be afraid. God will help us and the day will come when you'll see the constitution supreme and no dictatorship for a long time."
Later, in the central city of Multan, hundreds of police blocked about 1,000 attorneys from leaving a district court complex to stage a street rally in defiance of a ban. Both sides pelted each other with stones and officers swung batons to disperse the crowd.
An Associated Press reporter saw at least three lawyers were wounded, two bleeding from the head, and three police also were hurt by bricks flung by lawyers.
The clashes marked the second day of unrest since Musharraf, who took power in a 1999 coup, declared the emergency. He suspended the constitution, ousted independent-minded judges, put a stranglehold on the media and granted sweeping powers to authorities to crush dissent. Thousands of people have been rounded up and thrown in jail.
Many say Musharraf was making a last-ditch effort to cling to power, though he says his primary aim was to help fight rising Islamic extremism. The moves came ahead of a Supreme Court ruling on whether his recent re-election as president was legal. The top judge, Chaudhry, was removed and other independent-minded justices replaced.
There does not appear to be a groundswell of popular resistance in the nation of 160 million, which has been under military rule for much of its 60-year history. Cynicism and apathy over the political system is widespread. Demonstrations so far have been limited largely to opposition activists, rights workers and lawyers, angered by the attacks on the judiciary.
