Pervez Musharraf to return to Pakistan

GlobalPost

Pakistan’s former president Pervez Musharraf announced that he plans to return to Pakistan to contest the upcoming presidential elections. He will announce his return via video address at a Sunday rally in Karachi, the Daily Telegraph reported.

However, the controversial former leader is set to be arrested upon returning because of accusations he was behind the killing of Benazir Bhutto, the former prime minister who was assassinated after returning to Pakistan in 2008. Musharraf has been residing in London and Dubai since he was forced from power in 2007, Pakistan's Dawn newspaper reported. Pakistan's current president, Asif Zardari, inherited control of the Pakistan People's Party when his wife Benazir was killed in 2008.

More from GlobalPost: Pakistan's president defiant in speech.

Musharraf has recently called for bettering Pakistan's ties with Israel to counter the support the Jewish state lends to India in disagreements over Kashmir, the region that both Pakistan and India claim. Musharraf said "Pakistan also needs to keep readjusting its diplomatic stand toward Israel based on the mere fact that it exists and is not going away," according to the Times of India.

Fears are mounting that the Pakistan military, viewed by some as the most powerful part of the fragile government there, is repositioning itself to take control of the country. Whispers of a possible coup mean that Musharraf will be returning at one of the tensest times in Pakistan's recent political history, the Telegraph reported.

More from GlobalPost: Is Pakistan's army conspiring to take over the government?

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