Pervez Musharraf (born August 11, 1943, New Delhi, India—died February 5, 2023,Dubai, United Arab Emirates) was a Pakistanimilitary officer who took power in acoup in 1999. He served aspresident ofPakistan from 2001 to 2008.

Early life and military career

Musharraf moved with his family fromNew Delhi toKarachi in 1947, whenPakistan was separated from India. The son of a career diplomat, he lived inTurkey during 1949–56. He joined the army in 1964, graduated from the Army Command and Staff College inQuetta, andattended the Royal College of Defence Studies inLondon.

Musharraf held a number of appointments in the artillery, the infantry, andcommando units and also taught at the Staff College in Quetta and in the War Wing of the National Defence College. He fought in Pakistan’s 1965 and 1971 wars with India. Prime MinisterNawaz Sharif appointed him head of the armed forces in October 1998. Musharraf is believed to have played a key role in the opening stages of theKargil War, when Pakistani forces entered the Indian-administered portion of the disputedKashmir region. Fighting between Pakistani and Indian forces began in May 1999 and continued for several weeks until Sharif, under international pressure, ordered Pakistani troops to pull back to Pakistani-administered territory, a move that angered the military.

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Pakistan: The Pervez Musharraf government

Seizure of power

On October 12, 1999, while Musharraf was out of the country, Sharif dismissed him and tried to prevent the plane carrying Musharraf home from landing at the Karachi airport. The armed forces, however, took control of the airport and other government installations and deposed Sharif, paving the way for Musharraf to become head of amilitary government. Although he was generally considered to hold moderate views and promised an eventual return to civilian rule, Musharraf suspended the constitution and dissolved parliament. He formed theNational Security Council, made up of civilian and military appointees, to run Pakistan in theinterim.

Presidency

In early 2001 Musharraf assumed the presidency and later attempted to negotiate an agreement with India over the Kashmir region. Following theSeptember 11 attacks in 2001 in theUnited States and the subsequentU.S. invasion of Afghanistan later that year, the U.S. governmentcultivated close ties with Musharraf in an attempt to root out Islamic extremists in the Afghan-Pakistan border region.

Over the next several years, Musharraf survived a number of assassination attempts. He reinstated the constitution in 2002, though it was heavilyamended with the Legal Framework Order (LFO)—a provision of which extended his term as president for another five years. Parliamentary elections were held in October 2002, and in late 2003 the legislature ratified most provisions of the LFO.

In 2007 Musharraf sought reelection to the presidency, but he faced opposition from Pakistan’s Supreme Court, primarily over the issue of his continuing to serve simultaneously as both president and head of the military. The court thwarted his attempt to suspend the chiefjustice, and in October it delayed the results of Musharraf’s reelection (by the parliament). In November Musharraf responded by declaring a state of emergency. Citing growing terrorist threats, he suspended the constitution for a second time, dismissed the chief justice and replaced otherjustices on the Supreme Court, arrested opposition political leaders, and imposed restrictions on the independent press and media. Later that month the reconstituted Supreme Court dismissed the last legal challenges to his reelection, and he resigned his military post to become a civilian president. Musharraf ended the state of emergency in mid-December, though, before restoring the constitution, he instituted severalamendments to it that protected the measures enacted during emergency rule.

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Resignation as president

The poor performance of Musharraf’s party in the February 2008 parliamentary elections was widely seen as a rejection of the president and his rule. The elections yielded an opposition coalition headed by Sharif andAsif Ali Zardari, the widower of formerprime ministerBenazir Bhutto, who had been assassinated in December 2007. Citing graveconstitutional violations, the governing coalition moved in early August 2008 to beginimpeachment proceedings against Musharraf, and, faced with the impending charges, Musharraf announced his resignation on August 18.

Return to Pakistan and arrest

In October 2010, after a period of self-imposed exile, Musharraf announced the formation of a newpolitical party, theAll Pakistan Muslim League, and vowed to return to Pakistan in time for the 2013 national elections. He did so in March 2013, but his bid to stand in elections faced a variety of legal and political obstacles, including several open criminal investigations regarding his actions as president. On April 18 a Pakistani court disqualified him from entering the race because of an ongoing investigation regarding hissuspension of the constitution in 2007. He was arrested the following day to face charges stemming from the investigation. In August 2013, with Musharraf still underhouse arrest, murder charges were filed against him in connection with Bhutto’s assassination in 2007.

Final years

Musharraf was permitted to leave Pakistan to seek medical treatment in Dubai in 2016, where he remained thereafter. In late 2018 it was revealed that his health was rapidly deteriorating due toamyloidosis. He was convicted a year later in absentia on charges of high treason and sentenced to death, though his state of health made any return to Pakistan unlikely. In January 2020, the special court that issued the sentence was ruled unconstitutional, and hisconviction was overturned. Musharraf died in Dubai in 2023.