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ISLAMABAD : A Pakistani deputy attorney general resigned on Tuesday in protest at President Pervez Musharraf's removal of the chief justice, as a hearing into the deepening crisis was delayed by two weeks.
Musharraf suspended top judge Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry on March 9, sparking protests and plunging Pakistan into the most bitter political row since he seized power in a military coup in 1999.
Nasir Saeed Sheikh, one of three deputy attorney generals in Pakistan, became on Tuesday the most senior state lawyer to quit amid a wave of resignations in the judiciary.
"Yes I have resigned," Sheikh told AFP. "Under the prevailing constitutional position it is not possible for me to work."
Separately Javed Memon, a senior civil judge in the town of Kotri in southern Sindh province also resigned in protest, a Sindh High Court official said on condition of anonymity.
He is the eighth judge to stand down over the controversy.
Five judges resigned in Sindh on Monday, as well as a high court judge in central Punjab province. A civil judge in the central Pakistani city of Bahawalpur and a public prosecutor said they were quitting last week.
Chaudhry was due to make his third appearance before the Supreme Judicial Council, a panel of senior charges, on unspecified misconduct charges on Wednesday, but the hearing was postponed at the last minute until April 3.
Lawyers and hardline Islamic parties had pledged to hold nationwide protests on Wednesday, arousing suspicions that the hearing was delayed in a bid to cool off the situation.
The panel did not give a reason for the delay.
"The Supreme Judicial Council has adjourned the hearing of an application filed by Mr Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry in the reference against him to April 3, 2007," Supreme Court spokesman Arshad Munir told AFP.
"Notices to all concerned have been issued accordingly."
Chaudhry's previous appearances before the council have been marred by protests, including violent clashes in Islamabad on Friday when police fired tear gas and rubber bullets at protesters.
The suspended chief justice's senior counsel said on Tuesday he intended to move an application before the council, when it sits again, to call Musharraf as a witness.
"I will take the final decision after consulting Justice Chaudhry, but I want to cross-examine the president for his remarks about my client," counsel Aitzaz Ahsan told AFP.
Musharraf defended his decision to remove Chaudhry in an interview late Monday and said he would not impose a state of emergency over the growing unrest, or delay elections due later this year or early next.
"There is no emergency situation and emergency will not be declared," Musharraf told private Geo television.
However Ahsan said that Musharraf could easily change his mind.
"Musharraf changes his views overnight. If he can suspend the chief justice he can also impose the emergency," Ahsan said. - AFP/de
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