LAHORE, Oct 13: The Jamaat-i-Islami has decided in principle to launch a vigorous agitation to force President Pervez Musharraf to step down and set up an interim government to run the country.

The Jamaat’s central working committee, which met here on Saturday under the chairmanship of Qazi Husain Ahmed, also decided in principle to go for a march on Islamabad, a date for which will be decided subsequently, keeping in sight the objective conditions.

Jamaat sources say that the military government is working according to the dictates of the United States and, therefore, it has no right to stay in power.

Though the Jamaat’s stand is almost identical to that of the Alliance for Restoration of Democracy, there is no possibility of the two working on the same platform.

The PPP is now cooperating with the government while another important ARD component, the PML-N, is left with little strength to work against the government, Jamaat sources said while explaining why the JI-ARD cooperation was not possible despite the fact that both of them were opposed to the government.

The sources said that the Musharraf government committed many mistakes in the past two years which the Jamaat would highlight in public.

A resolution adopted by the meeting said US attacks on Afghanistan amounted to a naked aggression after which the Islamic Ummat was duty-bound to extend help to the oppressed Afghan people. It said that repeated statements that Pakistan would not take part in attacks on Afghanistan were misleading as it was already sharing intelligence with the US, allowing the use of its air space and providing other logistical support for strikes.

The meeting said it did not recognize the US right to declare any person or organization terrorist, specially because the United Nations was yet to define terrorism.

The resolution said the methodology the US had adopted to extirpate terrorism would lead to escalation of the menace instead of curbing it.

The resolution called upon President Musharraf to withdraw cooperation being extended to the US specially because President Bush, contrary to his earlier assurances, had indicated that war against Afghanistan would be a prolonged one and the US troops might stay in the war-ravaged country for long. The Jamaat said that instead of going for vengeance and using force against Afghanistan, the US should settle the matter through talks. Also, it said, the US should trace reasons behind the worldwide hatred against it.

The resolution said the US should also consider whether terrorism and oppression going on in Kashmir, Palestine and Chechnya also required some measures for eradication.

Assuring the people of Afghanistan its full support in their hour of trial, the Jamaat also appealed to the people of Pakistan to help their oppressed brethren.

The JI believed that the US would face the same fate which the Soviet Union had met after its invasion of Afghanistan.