Musharraf's autobiography to be launched in NYC

Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf, currently touring the United States, is all set for a high-profile launch of his autobiography in New York on September 25.

Musharraf, who arrived in New York from Havana on Sunday soon after his meeting with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on the margins of the Non-Aligned Movement summit in the Cuban capital, was approached by the Pakistani media for an advance copy of his book but he told them they have to wait till it is launched.

Keeping up with his commando image, the title of Musharraf's autobiography was borrowed from the Clint Eastwood Hollywood movie In Line with Fire.

Ahead of the book's launch, the author is scheduled to make appearances on some of the most watched TV shows in America.

Musharraf will be interviewed on NBC. The President will also make an appearance on Comedy Central's Daily Show with Jon Stewart, Pakistani newspaper Daily Times reported.

He will also be interviewed on National Public Radio's Morning Edition, which is heard through local affiliates around the country.

The book for which Musharraf reportedly received a million dollars as advance is being published by New York-based publisher Simon and Schuster and is scheduled to be launched at a function attended among others by United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan.

Musharraf would be the first serving Pakistani Army Chief and President to publish his autobiography. Such a venture was attempted by the previous military ruler Ayub Khan but only after he was unseated from power.

Ayub's son Gohar Ayub too is currently working on a book in which he claimed to have revealed secrets his father's government obtained about India's war plans ahead of 1965 war.

Musharraf's book is expected to counter the biography of former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif in which the deposed leader, who was unseated by Musharraf, charged him with plotting the Kargil conflict without obtaining permission from the government.

Besides providing an insight into his childhood and his rise in Pakistan Army and later as military ruler, Musharraf is expected to respond to Sharif's charges in detail and provide his version of Kargil conflict as well as his role when Sharif along with former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee signed the Lahore accord.

Musharraf's book, apparently ghost written by his long-term media friend Humayun Gohar, has already evoked enthusiasm in Pakistan as several shops displayed boards asking people to reserve copies. It was not clear whether the book would be available here on September 25.

Clrisa Hays, who is in charge of publicity at Simon and Schuster, said that since the book also had a Pakistani publisher called Ferozesons, Pakistani correspondents based in the US would have to go through the Pakistani publisher if they wished to obtain a copy.

"It is for the Pakistani publisher to sort it all out," she said in answer to a query.

Advance copies of the book have obviously been made available to the programmes on which the President is going to be interviewed, the newspaper reported.

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