On the ground in Pakistan, every leader of Mr Sharif's Pakistan Muslim League (Nawaz) party (PML-N) was being arrested. Some 1,000-4,000 party activists were also allegedly rounded up. The roads around Islamabad airport were blocked with road-making machinery. The few PML-N supporters who breached
this defence, after Mr Sharif's incoming plvibram five fingersane was sighted, were bludgeoned with tear-gas cannisters and beaten by riot police.
Inside the airport, paramilitary police encircled the plane and a nervous immigration official boarded it. With trembling hands he clutched a crumpled brown paper bag containing an immigration stamp. His task
was to admit Mr Sharif to Pakistan—so honouring his “inalienable right”. Wise to the ruse, Mr Sharif and his retinue refused to htory burch saleand over his passport. But shortly after disembarking he was charged with involvement in an alleged $20m money-laundering scam and led away, his passport apparently unstamped.
Pakistan, a place of 160m people and one of Asia's fastest-growing economies, should not be a banana republic. Yet, in its current crisis, that is increasingly how it appears. By ignoring the Supreme Court, General Musharkobe viraf has in effect declared a state of emergency. Were he now to offer Ms Bhutto a deal on her terms, almost incredible as this would be, she might feel compelled to decline. If the elections go ahead, the opposition parties may boycott them. They include the Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal (MMA), an alliance of Islamist parties previously allied with the general, as well as the PML-N and PPP.
And Pakistan faces another crisis, of security. It has a nationalist insurgency in its vast western province
of Baluchistan, a Taliban insurgency in its rugged north-west and sporadic al-Qaeda-style suicide-blasts in every main city. Official figures count around 250 suicide bombers, including some who were foiled by security forces, in the past five years. The most recentvibram 5 fingers, in North-West Frontier Province (NWFP) on September 11th, killed 18 people.
