CNN  is reporting that Pakistani President/military dictator Gen. Pervez Musharraf has agreed to step down as head of the country’s military, in an apparent concession made in negotiations with opposition leader Benazir Bhutto. 

The announcement isn’t official, but Bhutto believes it could be a step in the right direction for a more “democratic” Pakistan:

“This is no longer an issue in the negotiations, because General Musharraf recognizes that it is very difficult to move to a transition towards democracy when there’s a chief of army staff ruling the country,” Bhutto told CNN.

“I think he wants to make the right decision, so I expect he’s going to take the uniform off.”

Pakistani cabinet minister Sheikh Rashid confirmed that Musharraf has agreed to step down as army chief.

But it is up to Musharraf to announce his decision, Bhutto said, adding that the issue of his role as army chief is “no longer a hurdle in the negotiations that the opposition and I have been having with him.”

“Earlier we had left it to the courts to decide this issue,” she said, referring to Musharraf’s army chief position. “But now we have bilaterally decided that this issue will be resolved.”

Bhutto has previously said she is considering returning as Pakistan’s prime minister under Musharraf’s government if he steps down as head of Pakistan’s military.

She said negotiations between her opposition party and Musharraf involve appointing a caretaker government, holding fair elections and returning to parliament powers that were removed after the 1999 coup in which Musharraf seized power.

Bhutto was generally known to be an advocate for women’s rights during her tenure as Pakistani PM, however this raises an interesting dilemma for American strategic interests.  If there is anything to this gesture (and we don’t know that for sure yet), might it lead to a more democratic, albeit more Islamic regime in Pakistan? 

Does this put the Bush Administration in a tough spot?  A more “democratic” Pakistan, as we have learned in the case of Turkey, might not mean a more tolerant Pakistan.  Is this yet another instance where America must favor dictatorship over democratization?

UPDATE:

Cernig’s take on it:

Musharaff hasn’t said anything public as yet, and even if it’s true it remains to be seen what the army will say, but this is very encouraging news for Pakistani democracy. Here in the US, the neocons will either hate it or will try to spin it as being their idea and Bush’s plan all along (it wasn’t).

Hmm…but isn’t a muslim regime with access to nuclear weapons a potential problem for American interests?  How about Indian interests? 

Musharaff essentially ran a secular military government.  We’ve seen what Islamic democracy has meant for the Gaza Strip, Iraq, Iran and even Turkey.  Talk about voting against your own interests, the poor south has nothing on this. 

What if a (smart) Pakistani muslim were to run on economic populism and Islamic government in the “new” Pakistan, similar to the campaign of Ahmadenijad?