Sharif may return by mid-September

Exiled former Pakistani prime minister Nawaz Sharif has said he may return home in two or three weeks despite the threat of being thrown in jail by President Pervez Musharraf, and warned of "chaos" and even civil war if the general imposed Emergency in the country.

"They say that I should return before the beginning of month of Ramadan. I think it's about maybe two or three weeks away," Sharif, who recently won a Supreme Court order to return home, said in an interview to PBS in London over the weekend.

He was ousted in a military coup in 1999 by Musharraf and has been living in exile in Saudi Arabia and Britain ever since.

"If he (Musharraf) wants to put me in the jail, let him put me in the jail. I'm not scared of these things at all. So I will go. And if he does that, I will face that," he said.

The two-time prime minister urged Pakistan People's Party chief Benazir Bhutto, also a former premier, to abandon negotiations for a purported 'deal' with Musharraf, saying it will only lead to strengthening "dictatorship", and ruled out similar "back channel" negotiations between him and the president.

"I think her (Bhutto) negotiations with Musharraf will only strengthen dictatorship in Pakistan and it will be serving no cause to democracy," he said.

Sharif said he and Bhutto signed a charter of democracy almost one and a half years back, which "clearly says there can be no talks, no negotiations, and no deal with dictators, especially military rulers."

"So her entering into any deal with Musharraf is a very clear violation of the charter of democracy. I think those negotiations must be abandoned, because we Democrats must not be strengthening the hands of a dictator," Sharif said adding, his party doesn't believe in any "back channel" talks.

"This is a struggle for the restoration of democracy. And in the entire nation today, the entire civil society of the country, the lawyers community, the intelligentsia, the media, the political forces in the country are all together on this. And I think any backdoor channels will be an exercise in futility," he said.

On the possibility of imposition of Emergency, Sharif said: "It will be chaos in the country, and God forbid there could also be a possible civil war."

"We might be heading for a civil war, because the entire Pakistani society is up in arms against Musharraf's dictatorship. And they will not tolerate that," Sharif said.

Rediff News Bureau Adds:

In an interview to the Financial Times, Sharif also issued an unusually frank warning to Washington not to "equate Musharraf with Pakistan" unless it wished to give further impetus to Islamist extremism in the region.

"I do feel let down by the United States," the former prime minister said. "I will not use the word betrayed."