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Wednesday Notes
- The PPP and PML-N have yet to finalize all the cabinet posts, though should be done by the weekend. Sherry Rehman will be information minister, which was expected. The PPP will likely get both foreign affairs and defense. BBC Urdu reported yesterday that the PPP’s Shah Mehmood Qureshi will probably be minister of foreign affairs, while the PML-N’s Ishaq Dar is expected to be the finance minister. Both parties seem reluctant to touch the interior ministry. It’s difficult to see the PML-N accept the two toughest ministries (finance and interior).
- The Negroponte-Boucher tour remained at the top of Pakistani headlines.
- The two went to Peshawar, where they met with the NWFP governor. They tried to meet with Asfandyar Wali, but could not, due to security reasons. They went to FATA, specifically in Landi Kotal in the Khyber Agency, which isn’t as bad as some of the other agencies, but faces a rising Taliban presence (marked rise in attacks on NATO supply routes).
- The duo returned to Islamabad and met with Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gillani. It’s possible they met again with Asif Zardari after his meeting with the PML-N.
- Javed Hashmi, a senior PML-N MNA, described Negroponte as an “unwanted element,” while Shah Mehmood Qureshi gently differed with his colleague and claimed that the Negroponte visit was preplanned and simply coincided with this whole PM-no cabinet business.
- Negroponte and Boucher could have also headed to Karachi tonight to meet the governor of Sindh, Ishrat ul-Ibad. It’s been reported that Washington wants the MQM in the central government coalition.
- Nasrullah Babar said Baitullah Mehsud sent a message to him via an intermediary claiming that he didn’t kill Benazir Bhutto, as his group doesn’t attack women.
- Noorul Haq Qadri, an MNA from the FATA’s Khyber Agency, noted that the Democrats are calling from a withdrawal from Iraq, but not Afghanistan.
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