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Pakistan's Musharraf flies to UAE for medical treatment

Xinhua, March 18, 2016 Adjust font size:

Pakistan's former President, Pervez Musharraf, arrived in the United Arab Emirate on Friday to get medical treatment after the country's top court lifted a travel ban on him.

A group of Pakistani media persons, who traveled in Musharraf's plane, said the leader left the Dubai airport for his residence. His plane landed at Dubai airport around 5 a.m. local time there.

Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan announced on Thursday that the gov't had removed Musharraf's name on the Exit Control List, the list of the people who cannot go out of the country without the federal gov't permission, on the court's order.

Earlier the Supreme Court of Pakistan ordered the removal of the travel restrictions on Musharraf, enabling him to go abroad for medical treatment. Musharraf's lawyers told the court that he suffers from spinal problems and need urgent treatment.

The former president boarded a private airlines plane at the Karachi airport under tight security at around 4 a.m. local time. He left for Dubai where doctors will carry out his medical tests later on Friday, leaders of his All Pakistan Muslim League said.

The federal government had barred Musharraf, who quit as president in 2008, from leaving the country as he faces several cases including high treason. He had challenged the ban in the apex court on the plea that he needs treatment abroad.

The major opposition Pakistan Peoples Party criticized the gov't decision to allow Musharraf to leave the country as he faces several cases including the murder of former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto. The PPP Chairman Bilawal Bhutto said his party will protest in the parliament.

A special court, hearing the high treason case against Musharraf for abrogating the constitutions, had summoned him to personally appear on March 31. The former president has been formally charged in the case. However, he may not be able to appear.

Last month a local court in Islamabad had issued a non-bailable warrant for his arrest in a 2007 murder case of a religious cleric, Abdul Rashid Ghazi, who was killed in a security forces' raid on the Islamabad's Red Mosque that had killed nearly 90 students and 11 security men.

The former president was also charged in the murder case of former Prime Minister, Benazir Bhutto, who was killed in a suicide attack and gunshots in the garrison city of Rawalpindi. Musharraf has been formally indicted in the case.

Musharraf, also former army chief, had dismissed the second gov't of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, in 1999.

He quit as the president in 2008 fearing a possible impeachment by the parliament and had gone out of Pakistan. He returned to the country from self-exile in 2013 to take part in parliamentary elections, however, the courts barred him from holding any public office.

Musharraf now heads a political party"All Pakistan Muslim League" or APML. Endit