The New Nation - Internet Edition

Reuters, Islamabad

Nawaz Sharif, the prime minister deposed by President Pervez Musharraf in a coup eight years ago, will return to Pakistan from Saudi Arabia on Sunday, his brother Shahbaz Sharif told a Pakistani news channel.

General Musharraf, under intense criticism at home and abroad for imposing emergency rule three weeks ago, agreed to Sharif's return in discussions with Saudi King Abdullah in Riyadh this week, according to a leader of the ruling Pakistan Muslim League (PML).

Sharif met King Abdullah in Riyadh for a "farewell meeting" on Friday.

"We will fly on Sunday on Saudi Airlines directly from Medina to Lahore," Shahbaz, speaking from London, told the private television channel ARYOne World. Sharif will be joined by his wife Kulsoom and Shahbaz in Saudi and they will perform a pilgrimage to Mecca before taking the flight to Lahore, the capital of Punjab province and power base of the Sharif family. Both brothers went into exile a year after the 1999 coup. By returning on Sunday they will get back in time to file election nominations in order to contest a parliamentary poll on Jan. 8. Politically isolated, Musharraf allowed another former prime minister, Benazir Bhutto, to return to Pakistan last month after years abroad, by granting her protection against prosecution in old corruption cases she says were politically motivated. The president sought to engage Bhutto as a potential ally, but Sharif refused to negotiate with the man who overthrew him.

Musharraf blocked an earlier attempt by Sharif to end his exile in September. Sharif was put on a flight to Jeddah hours after landing in Islamabad on Sept. 10, but Saudi Arabia became increasingly embarrassed by its complicity.

Musharraf imposed a two-term limit on the prime ministership in 2002, which currently bars both Sharif and opposition leader Benazir Bhutto from another stint. Having spent eight years trying to marginalise Sharif, and allowing Bhutto back last month, Musharraf appears to have admitted his failure to re-engineer Pakistan's polity, split by the coup that ended a decade of chaotic civilian rule.