ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — Pakistan's opposition called on Gen. Pervez Musharraf to lift a state of emergency, threatening today to boycott upcoming parliamentary elections unless citizens' rights were fully restored and he stepped down as army chief.

Former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto, one of the country's opposition leaders, prepared to launch a cross-country caravan to protest military rule. Police ramped up security for her, saying they had received intelligence that a suicide bomber was planning to attack her.

Bhutto was targeted in an Oct. 18 suicide attack on her homecoming from exile to the southern city of Karachi, killing 145 other people.

Musharraf said Sunday he would stick to a January schedule for the election, but set no time limit on emergency rule, which has resulted in the arrests of thousands of his critics, a ban on rallies and the blacking out of independent TV networks.

The measures, he argued, were necessary to ensure "absolutely fair and transparent elections" and to step up the fight against Islamic militants threatening Pakistan.

Bhutto welcomed his Jan. 9 cutoff date for the vote but said today that free and fair elections were not "foreseeable" under the emergency and with Musharraf still army chief.

"In the given circumstances, boycotting elections could be an option," she told reporters. "We will consult the other political parties."

In Lahore, about 200 police were guarding the house where Bhutto was staying, with snipers on surrounding rooftops, ahead of her 185-mile protest caravan to Islamabad, due to begin Tuesday.

Bhutto also demanded Musharraf step down as army chief when his current term as president expires Nov. 15 — a step he is promising to take once a reconstituted Supreme Court validates his recent victory in a controversial presidential election.