Commonwealth head visits Pakistan amid election turmoil

Sep 19, 2007, 6:09 GMT

Islamabad - Commonwealth Secretary-General Don McKinnon arrived in Islamabad Wednesday on a three-day visit likely to be dominated by political upheavals as Pakistan prepares to hold presidential and parliamentary elections.

The head of the 53-member grouping of former British colonies was due to reiterate its call of two years ago for President Pervez Musharraf to step down as army chief and enable Pakistan to become a full-fledged civilian democracy after eight years of military rule.

The army general on Tuesday announced that he will relinquish his military status after his anticipated re-election by parliament in a vote due before October 15. Pakistan is then scheduled to hold elections of new assemblies.

But opposition forces have been trying to block Musharraf's candidacy on constitutional grounds which they say prohibit him from running in uniform.

Musharraf has come under increasing pressure from the opposition in recent months after a bungled attempt to remove the country's chief justice, while battling to contain a rising Islamic militancy in the tribal areas by Afghanistan as well as in the capital.

McKinnon was also to meet with Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz and Foreign Minister Khurshid Kasuri.

The Commonwealth represents one quarter of the world's governments, one-third of its population and one-fifth of global trade, and still carries considerable authority in Pakistan, which gained independence from Britain after partition from India in 1947.