Ex-Pakistani premier criticises US support for her country
Former Pakistan Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto says the US should not support a military dictator in her country.
Ms Bhutto insists the US must not allow its strategic considerations to foist a dictatorship in Pakistan.
The military ruler, General Pervez Musharraf, seized power in a 1999 military coup. He has promised to hold elections before the end of 2002.
Musharraf has helped the US-led international coalition with intelligence, military bases and other logistical support to fight the Taliban and the al-Qaida network in Afghanistan.
Bhutto said the US, as the most powerful democracy, and India, as the largest democracy, have a role in seeing Pakistan through a free and fair election next year.
"I took Indian leaders into confidence about my own efforts to convince the American administrators ... that a democratic Pakistan is a necessity for a stable South Asia," she said.
Bhutto was elected prime minister of Pakistan in 1988 and was in power off and on until 1996, when the president dismissed her for alleged corruption.
She faces possible arrest on return to Pakistan on corruption charges and lives in self-imposed exile, dividing her time between England and the United Arab Emirates.
Bhutto said in New Delhi that her Pakistan Peoples' Party was negotiating several demands with Musharraf's government, including proposals for free and fair elections, release of political prisoners and her safe return to Pakistan.
The negotiations haven't met with much success. "There is still a wide gulf between the two sides," she said.
