World Notes

"I am not a fundamentalist," declared Prime Minister Mian Nawaz Sharif last week, but that did not stop him from introducing broad legislation to make strict Islamic law, or Shari'a, the "supreme law of Pakistan." Addressing a joint session of Pakistan's Senate and National Assembly, Nawaz Sharif outlined a legislative package that includes changes in the education and judicial systems and the restructuring of the economy along Islamic lines. The proposed legislation fulfills Nawaz Sharif's election promise to the small but powerful Islamic parties that helped him defeat Benazir Bhutto last October.

Fundamentalist groups have reacted with cautious approval, but opponents of the bill, including educated women and lawyers, charge that it would pave the way for a militant and repressive Muslim theocracy, confine women to their homes and bring the media and the educational system under the control of Islamic clerics. The worst-case interpretation of Shari'a also favors the banning of music, dance and cinema, and the mandatory wearing of veils by women in public.