Pakistan faces a "perfect storm" of crises, with its US-backed fight against al Qaeda and the Taliban faltering and the country lurching towards bankruptcy, analysts and opposition figures say.
Dramatic developments over the past week on both the security and economic fronts underscored more clearly than ever the massive challenges facing the fragile government of the world's only nuclear-armed Islamic nation.
First the International Monetary Fund announced on Wednesday that Islamabad had sought a politically unpopular rescue package to give the country the four billion dollars it needs to avoid defaulting on its foreign debts.
Parliament meanwhile ended a historic two-week session by passing a unanimous resolution that called for an "urgent review" of Pakistan's role in the "war on terror" and for fresh talks with militant leaders.
"Pakistan is truly at a crossroads," Talat Masood, a leading security analyst and retired Pakistan army general, told AFP. "If the economic situation continues to decline it will reinforce militancy and make it more difficult for the government to tackle. They need to do better than the past six or seven months," Masood said.
If local media dubbed the slaying of Benazir Bhutto as Pakistan's 9/11 and JFK rolled into one, the crisis now faced by President Asif Ali Zardari, her widower, is arguably even greater.
His government faces US pressure to crush militant safe havens in its tribal belt bordering Afghanistan, where al Qaeda and Taliban rebels have formed new alliances seven years after fleeing the US-led invasion of Afghanistan. The army said Saturday it had turned a corner with the capture of a strategic town in the tribal zone of Bajaur after a two-month offensive. It has also hailed the formation of tribal militias opposed to the Taliban.
But in an apparent sign of US frustration, suspected US missile strikes on insurgent targets in Pakistan have soared in recent weeks. Eleven people were killed in an attack on a centre run by a leading Taliban commander on Thursday.
Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani admitted the problems the government faces in a statement earlier this week, saying that the "very stability and survival of Pakistan is at stake." "Our resources are over-stretched and our economy is severely impacted by each bomb blast and each suicide attack," he said.
But Zardari's efforts to win public support for an end to the violence ran into trouble when parliament dealt an apparent snub of Islamabad's alliance with Washington.
Its resolution on Wednesday night hit out at the US missile strikes and recommended increased talks with militants. Previous talks have been criticised by Islamabad's western allies for allowing the insurgents to regroup.
There was no mention meanwhile of Pakistan's powerful intelligence agencies - accused by Washington and Kabul of sponsoring the very militants they were meant to be fighting. Yet the government is being distracted by Pakistan's economic woes, a toxic brew of debt, inflation and a sinking currency redolent of the dark days of the 1990s before the coup that brought former president Pervez Musharraf to power.
Needing at least four billion dollars to avoid defaulting on its foreign debts, key allies including the United States, China and Saudi Arabia have all rebuffed Zardari's appeals for extra cash.
News that Islamabad had sought talks with the IMF over aid was met with mounting resentment at home. Concerns that Pakistanis will suffer from tax hikes and spending cuts resulting from tough IMF conditions come on top of local newspaper reports that defence spending could be reduced by up to 30 percent.
The government denies the figure. "The approval of this loan will certainly help us but the government should negotiate safely with the IMF and not succumb to their tough conditions," leading investor Aqeel Karim Dhedhi told AFP.
Pakistan was also suffering because of the huge cost of its campaign against the militants, despite the 10 billion dollars it has received from the United States since 2001, a leading opposition figure said.
"Pakistan is paying a heavy price to be the frontline state in the war on terror," Khwaja Asif, a leading member of the party of former premier Nawaz Sharif, told AFP. "It will be tantamount to killing our people to accept the IMF's conditions," he said.
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