Former Pakistani President Makes Home In London

Pervez Musharraf, the former Pakistani president, Bush administration pal in The War Against Terror (TWAT for short), and the youngest member of 2004's Death List, has found himself a new home: he's taken up residence in a house just off the Edgware Road. With life in Pakistan dangerous for a man who has cultivated as many enemies as Musharraf — his escapes from numerous assassination attempts read like the script from an Asian James Bond film — this London bolthole offers some relief. His stay here is not without controversy: in addition to a security detail paid for out of his own pocket, the former President is also guarded by Scotland Yard officers. Labour peer Lord Ahmad has written to the Home Secretary demanding the police protection be dropped, calling his presence a "threat to peace and public order". He has a point: the streets of London have often been the theatre on which foreign political intrigue plays out — the poisoning of Alexander Litvinenko, for example, or the murder of Bulgarian dissident Georgi Markov, the anniversary of which passed this week. Allowing the focal figure for recent Pakistani politics to live here may prove to be an unwise decision.