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Former Pakistan Prime minister Benazir Bhutto said on Wednesday that she will not make any deal with President Pervez Musharraf until he gives up his position as chief of the army.
Her comments to a private television channel come after Pakistani officials said that Musharraf had been in talks with Bhutto, now in exile in Dubai and London, and her opposition Pakistan People's Party (PPP). There has been speculation that Bhutto, the country's first female premier, could return home to stand in election due at the end of this year or early next and lend support to the embattled Musharraf.
"I deny all reports of a deal. We don't want army rule as it is not compatible with our politics," Bhutto told Hum TV in Dubai in an interview to be aired later Wednesday, a transcript of which was obtained by AFP.
"The contacts were there since 2002, and it's no secret. We are dealing with issues, as we want a reformist agenda. If something happens I will tell you, but I've been hearing reports of a deal for the last seven years," Bhutto said.
When asked if she would accept a deal with Musharraf still in uniform, she replied: "Musharraf knows the opposition's views about the uniform issue. He knows what civil society and people from a cross-section of society want."
The most serious is a crisis over his removal of the country's chief justice, which has sparked a series of protests backed by Bhutto's party along with other opposition groups. Railways Minister Sheikh Rashid told AFP last week that "serious negotiations" were under way between the PPP and the government but that they would not necessarily succeed.
But Bhutto also hit out at the government for failing to deal with corruption cases which have been hanging over her and her husband for the past 10 years and which forced them to go into exile.
Bhutto said that her contacts with Nawaz Sharif-her exiled former rival and successor as prime minister, with whom she has formed the opposition Alliance for the Restoration of Democracy-were "intact". The pair have held several meetings in the past year.
Meanwhile Bhutto also criticised Musharraf for failing to tackle a "soft revolution" by Islamists, after a hardline mosque in Islamabad threatened to launch suicide bombings and issued a fatwa against a female minister.

Copyright Agence France-Presse, 2007

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