Milenko Kindl

ISLAMABAD (Reuters) - Pakistan braced for protests against emergency
rule on Monday, while President Pervez Musharraf faced mounting
pressure from the United States to hold parliamentary elections in
January.
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Declaring an emergency on Saturday, General Musharraf cited spiraling
militancy and hostile judges to justify his action.

Police detained opposition figures and lawyers -- between 400 and 500
according to Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz -- and placed reporting curbs
on the media to stifle the risk of outrage spilling on to the streets.

Musharraf, who seized power in a coup in 1999, also suspended the
constitution.

U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice expressed disappointment with
Musharraf in terms seldom heard before from U.S. officials more
accustomed to praising the Pakistani leader's support in the battle
against al Qaeda.

"The United States has never put all of its chips on Musharraf," Rice
said, urging Pakistan to get back on the road to democracy, and
warning U.S. aid to its ally was under review.

Washington has given Islamabad around $10 billion over the last five
years.

Despite the detentions, a lawyers' movement that led the fight against
Musharraf when he tried to sack the country's top judge earlier this
year, was planning protests in front of courts in most major cities.

Lawyers, journalists, opposition politicians, and ordinary Pakistanis
said they believed Musharraf's main motive in declaring emergency rule
was to pre-empt the Supreme Court invalidating his re-election as
president last month.

"Many people in Pakistan believe that it has nothing to do with
stopping terrorism, and it has everything to do with stopping a court
verdict that was coming against him," former Prime Minister Benazir
Bhutto said on Sunday.

The Court had been due to reconvene on Monday to determine Musharraf's
right to have stood for re-election while still army chief. But
judges, including Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry, have been sacked
and all proceedings cancelled this week.