Country Survey
Pakistan
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the Despite a continued growth in Pakistan's economy and the Gross Domestic Produce (GDP), internal political bickering and violent sectarian clashes continue to bring the country to its knees.
President Zia ul-Haq, who has led Pakistan since the coup d'etat he organized in 1977, has recently led a mini-coup and deposed the civilian Government which he had set up. The Government, headed by Prime Minister Moham- med Khan Junejo, had been in power for only 2 years before it was summarily dismissed.
The country may well be thrown into political turmoil as a result, and President Zia's expected decision to delay elec- tions until next year could lead to further destabilization.
The present political climate in Pakistan could hardly be described as attractive to foreign investors who may be thinking of investing in the country.
In the last few months, Pakistan has been rocked by violent ethnic and sectarian unrest, and the situation is not helped by the underlying ‘arms-and-drugs culture'.
In April, 40 people died in Mafia-style warring over drugs in Karachi, and another 150 died in sectarian battles in north- ern Pakistan.
A legacy of the Afghanistan War is the number of illegal weapons now in the hands of Pakistanis. Police in Pakistan estimate that about 3 million illegal weapons are hidden
away.
The different sects do not fight with sticks and knives any longer, they fight with mortars and heavy machine guns.
The dismissal of the civilian Government has been wel- comed by many in Pakistan where opposition parties have been calling for fresh general elections ever since the now- deposed Prime Minister Junejo was elected in non-party
elections in 1985.
There was little sympathy for the Junejo Government be- cause of the extensive corruption within it, but now that the country is faced with the possibility of military rule, and the prospect of a general election is becoming less likely in the near future, many opposition politicians are becoming in- creasingly worried that the struggle for democracy in Paki- stan is facing a serious setback.
Pakistan is also under pressure from India which is claiming that the Government in Islamabad is arming the Sikh separatists in India an accusation that Pakistan vehemently denies.
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Relations between Pakistan and India have, at best, been strained ever since post independence partition in 1947.
There has been much military posturing along the border between the 2 countries over the years, and the occasional
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