Pakistan offers to fly Musharraf's sick mother home

The Pakistani government Friday offered to fly home the sick mother of former president Pervez Musharraf, who faces a series of major criminal cases and is barred from leaving the country.

The former general is accused of a range of offences related to his 1999-2008 rule of the nuclear-armed nation, including treason and the murder of former prime minister Benazir Bhutto.

The pursuit of criminal cases against the former army chief has put the government on a potential collision course with the powerful military.

It has been suggested that one way to avoid such a potentially destabilising clash would be to allow Musharraf to leave the country on compassionate grounds, to see his sick and elderly mother in Dubai.

His legal team have sought permission for him to leave Pakistan in recent weeks, but without success so far.

On Friday the government said judges must decide Musharraf's fate, but offered to bring his 95-year-old mother to Pakistan to continue medical treatment.

"For the sake of fulfilling obligations of humanity, the prime minister of Pakistan is ready to send a special plane or ambulance to bring his mother to Pakistan so that she can live with her son and carry on with her medical treatment here," a government statement said.

The start of Musharraf's trial for treason was delayed on Tuesday because of a bomb scare and the hearing is now expected to go ahead on January 1.

The charges relate to Musharraf's imposition of emergency rule in November 2007 and if found guilty he could face the death penalty or life imprisonment.

His aides and lawyers have dismissed the cases as politically motivated, accusing the government and others of trying to use the courts to settle old scores.

Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, who won a third term in May's general election, was the man Musharraf ousted when he seized power in a bloodless coup in 1999.

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Cork mother to complete ’12 marathons of Christmas’ in sports-shop window

Marathon runner and new mother Joanne Fearon today ran the first in a dozen marathons she plans to complete in the days before Christmas.

The Cork woman — who gave birth just four months ago — plans to finish ‘The 12 marathons of Christmas’ with the final leg on Christmas Eve, in a bid to raise fund for the neonatal ward of the CUH.

“My husband has the Guinness world record for the fastest marathon in a fireman suit and we’re, to put it mildly, a little bit competitive,” the Cobh native told the TheScore.ie after her first 26-mile run this afternoon in Maher’s sports shop in Cork city centre.

“So I thought I’d come up with an idea and I’ve just had a baby myself so the marathon distance suits me because it fits between feeds. And then I thought it was a good play on the 12 pubs of Christmas and it was a a good opportunity to raise a few quid for a good cause.

“We had the baby four months ago,” the Cobh native continues. “I left hospital on the Friday, took Saturday and Sunday off and was back in the gym on the Monday. I have 60 marathons done — I did Clonakilty last weekend — and then I’ve done a lot of ultra marathons, Ironman triathlons and various other events.”

Despite her running experience however, Fearon insists the task ahead is daunting.

“It’s a challenge. The first couple of days should be fine but then you start moving into unknown territory. It’s never going to be straight-forward but it could be anything from a little bit complicated to very, very painful,” she says.

Though tonight the runner admits she’ll have a better idea of a fundraising target when the donation buckets are emptied out and tallied up, Fearon says she won’t have much time for recovery sessions.

“My husband says he has to take the children for the four hours and half hours while I’m running so it’s back to normality the minute I step off the treadmill.

“I’ll have earned my turkey this year, won’t I?”

You can find Joanne Fearon’s donations page here

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