India-Pakistan: August 21, 2002

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In Kashmir, rebel violence left three civilians, three policemen and seven rebels dead. 

Pakistani president Musharraf has given himself power to overrule the parliament for the next five years. He has also established a National Security Council (containing four senior military men and eight civilians) that is supposed to prevent military take overs in the future. Pakistan has been unsuccessful to get a working democracy going in the past half century. The elected politicians tend to be very corrupt. The military is much less corrupt, so generals inevitably take over from the civilian politicians, vow to stamp out corruption, fail, hold elections and repeat the cycle.