Dec 17, 2019

Pakistan sentences former leader Pervez Musharraf to death

 Former Pakistani president General Pervez Musharraf speaks at the Council on Foreign Relations on November 2, 2011 in New York City.

Pakistan's former military ruler Gen. Pervez Musharraf. Photo: Spencer Platt/Getty Images

A court in Pakistan sentenced the country's former military ruler Gen. Pervez Musharraf in absentia on Tuesday to death for high treason, the BBC reports.

Why it matters: The ruling in the case of Musharraf, who's been in Dubai since 2016, marks "the first time in Pakistan's 72-year history that a military ruler was tried with high treason for imposing emergency rule and suspending the constitution in 2007," per Bloomberg, which notes he was a key U.S. ally following the 9/11 attacks.

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