| President Pervez Musharraf will tell his countrymen this week that after 20 years of rampant extremism, the South Asian nation will return to its original values as a modern, tolerant Islamic state, according to the country's foreign minister. "We are reverting to the dream of our founding father who envisaged Pakistan as a moderate and progressive Islamic state based on principles of freedom and tolerance," Pakistani Foreign Minister Abdus Sattar said in an interview yesterday. "The subject of his speech will be militancy and extremism." That would indicate a sea change in Pak policy. It should also fire up all the religious lunatics against Musharraf. It'll be interesting to see if he can hold it together. |