In the past few weeks, the situation has begun to develop a dynamism of its own. The years of political stagnation have been forgotten in a matter of a few months. Indeed, events appear now to be beyond the control of the presidential palace. Musharraf himself set this chain of events in motion last spring. In order to secure his re-election, he made the fatal mistake of trying to manipulate the country's constitution. To achieve this goal he was willing to risk removing Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry from office on trumped-up corruption charges. However, the ploy failed and boosted the democratic opposition who started calling for the return of their exiled leaders.

Although ex-premier Nazwar Sharif's attempt to re-enter the country last week resulted in his immediate deportation, this can only be viewed as a temporary setback. The return of both the opposition leaders, Sharif and Benazir Bhutto, seems now inevitable. Also, since 17 September, it is apparent to everyone that even Musharraf knows that he will have to take off his uniform to get Bhutto's support for his planned election as president. No one has said anything about how long his new term in office will be. The price he will have to pay will be

Bhutto's return as Prime Minister in the new government. Washington and its G8 partners are behind these developments. US special envoys, who frequently call on Musharraf in Islamabad, no longer believe that the president can lead Pakistan, an important nuclear power in the region, in the right direction on his own. The threat posed by Islamist extremists is now simply too great. The US and their Western allies -- including Germany -- now fear further terrorist attacks "Made and planned in Pakistan".

On account of Washington's pressure, Musharraf has had to slowly back away from his policy of appeasing the country's Islamist extremists, especially in the tribal areas along the Afghan border. This could not have been easy because the Pakistani intelligence service -- the ISI -- has apparently been successfully infiltrated by extremists, that is by the very same group of people Pakistan supported in the fight against the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan. Meanwhile, the army has launched a massive campaign against the Taliban and other extremist forces, and has suffered considerable numbers of casualties. Furthermore, the army also put down the insurrection at the Red Mosque in the heart of Islamabad. This change, of course, was, however, regarded as "too little, too late" by the West.

Musharraf is now caught between a rock and a hard place: for Pakistan's democratic opposition he is a dictator, who is reluctant to restore democracy. For the Islamists, he is a traitor, a practising Muslim who is preventing the establishment of an Islamist state. The

fact that Musharraf is constantly talking to the USA and Pakistani democrats just proves how much power he has already lost. The almost daily Supreme Court verdicts against Musharraf's rule also make his loss of power obvious to everyone. Instead of supporting the head of state, the judiciary is supporting the democratic opposition in the country against its top representative.

At the moment nobody knows how long Musharraf can survive politically. But he knows that the West cannot weaken him as long as the threat of terrorism remains and a return to democracy is uncertain. But the period of unconditional support must come to an end. Future support has to be linked to a return to democracy. This way, the country can be stabilised. And one thing should not be forgotten in the West: the West can help in many ways but, like in the case of Afghanistan, if a lasting solution is to be found, it has to be the work of the democratic forces within Pakistan.