Pakistan denies coup rumours while Musharraf away

Pervez Musharraf

ISLAMABAD - Pakistan has denied rumours of a coup attempt against President Pervez Musharraf while he is visiting the United States.

Newspaper offices and journalists were inundated with telephone calls and text messages inquiring about the rumours, which coincided with a widespread power cut.

But television programmes did not allude to them until Geo Television ran a ticker headline saying Information Minister Mohammad Ali Durrani had accused "rumour mongers" of exploiting the power cut.

Reuters made checks with senior government as well as military officials, and journalists saw nothing unusual in the capital or the neighbouring garrison city of Rawalpindi.

Durrani, who is travelling with Musharraf, told Reuters from New York: "These rumours were sparked by the power breakdown. These are baseless. These rumours spread because televisions were off and telephones were on."

A military official who declined to be named added: "It's totally rubbish."

Last week Thaksin Shinawatra was ousted as Thai prime minister while attending the United Nations General Assembly in New York -- which Musharraf also attended.

Medical check

Durrani also said Musharraf had had a routine medical check-up in Texas with a Pakistani-American doctor.

"He is absolutely all right," he said.

Musharraf, who came to power in a bloodless military coup seven years ago and has controversially held onto his role as chief of army staff, is due to launch his autobiography In the Line of Fire in New York on Monday.

He also has a second meeting with President George W. Bush, along with Afghan President Hamid Karzai, and is due back in Pakistan by the end of the week.

Power cuts are not unusual in Pakistan but Sunday's outage, which blacked out large parts of the country including Islamabad, Rawalpindi and the eastern city of Lahore for several hours, was unusually extensive.

Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz said maintenance work on a transmission line in northern Pakistan had caused the breakdown, and officials at the state-run power utility ruled out sabotage.

Musharraf has survived several assassination attempts since withdrawing Pakistan's support for the Taleban in neighbouring Afghanistan in 2001, after the Islamist militia refused to surrender its guest, Osama bin Laden, in the wake of al Qaeda's September 11 attacks on the United States.

While fears of assassination remain, speculation about Musharraf's grip on power is seldom heard, as there is no overt political challenge to him.

Leaders of the mainstream opposition parties are living in exile, and while some Islamist leaders talk of toppling the president, most diplomats and analysts reckon Musharraf could only be ousted by a coup from within the military.

- REUTERS