Pakistani Police Arrest Former President Musharraf - Charges Include Treason

Source: Facebook

April 19, 2013 - Former Pakistani president Gen. Pervez Musharraf was arrested today at his farmhouse near Islamabad.

The arrest comes just one day after he fled the Islamabad High Court that ordered his arrest in a 2007 case regarding his decision to dismiss judges and to impose emergency rule that year. Musharraf faces multiple charges, including treason.

This story, frankly, is frigging weird, as this report from Foreign Policy blog on Thursday, 18 April indicates:

"Pervez Musharraf's bizarre return to Pakistan from self-imposed exile, which has already been marked by the former president being disqualified from upcoming elections and live-tweeting his bail hearing (and exercise routine), just got even more bizarre, with the once-all powerful Pakistani leader fleeing a courtroom in Islamabad on Thursday after judges ordered his arrest over a bitter 2007 clash with the country's judiciary." As I said, it's frigging weird. Read the Foreign Policy post, which includes some fun (and frigging weird) video.

Keep in mind that Musharraf fled from the law, after the court ordered his arrest. He ran away to his farmhouse yesterday. Today, Musharraf posted this strange message on his Facebook page at approximately 2:10 AM (New York time):

I have today brought an end to the mass distraction and media frenzy generated by the unwarranted act of the Islamabad High Court. The allegations leveled against me in the detention of judges case could not be further from the truth and were filed against me by an unrelated individual eight months after the alleged act; not even one of the alleged aggrieved judges is the petitioner. These allegations are politically motivated and I will fight them in the trial court, where the truth will eventually prevail. PM

Wait, what? It took the police and army troops to arrest Musharraf at his hidey hole in the outskirts of Islamabad, yet he wrote that he "brought an end to the mass distraction and media frenzy?" The poor man does not seem to realize that his own strange behavior has provided legitimate fodder for the media's "frenzy."

Needless to say, this story is developing and promises to provide many entertaining - and frigging weird - moments in the coming months.

Related:

• Pakistani police arrest Pervez Musharraf in Islamabad BBC
• Pak police arrest former president Pervez Musharraf... India Today
• Former Pakistani military ruler Pervez Musharraf flees court after arrest order Telegraph UK
• Pakistan’s ex-president Musharraf barricades himself inside Islamabad estate as police and army block off the area Voice of Russia
• Pervez Musharraf's doomed return The Guardian UK