Pakistan Lawyers to End Courts Boycott

In a sign that the difficult situation in Pakistan may be resolving, lawyers throughout the country plan to end their boycott of the country's appellate courts.

Bar leaders reportedly criticized the continued detention of senior judges and lawyers, including Aitzaz Ahsan, president of the Supreme Court Bar Association, and Iftikhar Chaudhry, the deposed chief justice of the Pakistan Supreme Court, and called for their immediate release. However, they also felt that continuing the boycott would be too hard on clients who need access to the courts, according to Reuters and the Daily Times.

As discussed in earlier ABAJournal.com posts, the country's president, Pervez Musharraf, suspended the constitution, imposed a state of emergency and fired numerous appellate judges on Nov. 3. This resulted in massive, lawyer-led protests and thousands of attorneys were reportedly arrested and jailed at one point.

Chaudry has not been popular with Musharraf, both because he has urged adherence to the rule of law and defiance of the state of emergency, and because of his tremendous popularity.

Protests also took place in the United States, including a rare march on Washington, D.C., organized by the ABA that was discussed in an ABA Journal magazine article.

Meanwhile, the London Times reports that Scotland Yard believes al-Qaida is responsible for the assassination of former prime minister Benazir Bhutto, a political opponent of Musharraf, on Dec. 27.

For now, at least, the New York Times reported a little over a week ago, it appears that Musharraf has successfully muzzled his critics.