PPP to resign from assemblies on Oct 5 if talks with Musharraf fail

If the government negotiators do not take the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) proposals seriously, the Central Executive Committee and the Federal Council of the party have decided to resign from the assemblies on October 5, a day prior to the presidential election.

London, Oct 4 : If the government negotiators do not take the Pakistan People's Party (PPP) proposals seriously, the Central Executive Committee and the Federal Council of the party have decided to resign from the assemblies on October 5, a day prior to the presidential election.

The decision was taken at a joint meeting of the party's committees chaired by PPP chief Benazir Bhutto in London, party sources said.

Bhutto told the meeting that it was the principled stance of the party that if President Pervez Musharraf contests the presidential elections in uniform, the party would not support him and would resign from the Parliament.

"Though the negotiations are still on, the negotiators are not responding positively and are trying to force the party to compromise, which is wrong," sources quoted Bhutto, as saying.

During the meeting, the party leadership wrote its resignations and submitted them to the Bhutto, sources said.

They said that the meeting would continue on Thursday and a press conference would be held at 4.40 p.m. (PST).

Another PPP meeting chaired by Amin Fahim in Lahore decided that the resignations should be submitted from the ARD platform, the Daily Times reported.

Earlier, Bhutto said that negotiation on a power-sharing deal with Musharraf had been "totally stalled".

Speaking ahead of the meeting of the party's Central Executive Committee, which comes a day after Musharraff dropped graft charges against her, Bhutto however, said that corruption charges against her had been dropped were "disinformation"."It's absolutely wrong, the news the corruption charges have been dropped," Bhutto claimed.

ANI