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Islamabad: Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf's memoir could project his status on the world stage, but it could touch off controversy and strain relations with neighbours, analysts said a day after the book's launch.
Just why Musharraf chose to write his autobiography, titled In the Line of Fire, while still holding office has perplexed many Pakistanis, and some questioned his right to publish the memoir.
The release of the book during a year in which Musharraf's popularity, by his own admission, had hit a low added to people's consternation.
"I think he wrote this book at a time when he is thoroughly discredited," Roedad Khan, a former senior bureaucrat, said.
General Musharraf, who has controversially retained his role as army chief, has had to walk a tightrope since forging an alliance with the United States after September 11, 2001, as the majority of Pakistanis disagree strongly with US foreign policy.
But, for foreign readers, Musharraf's chapters dealing with the war on terrorism could generate a sense of relief that the general is still at the helm.
"He is telling the West that you have to keep me there, if you want to win the war on terror," said Khan, who believes the publication of the memoirs may have breached an oath of office.
Having come to power in a bloodless military coup seven years ago, Pakistanis are wondering how long Musharraf intends to hold onto the presidency, knowing that he wants to stay on beyond general elections due at the end of next year.
Just a day before the release of the book, with Musharraf in the United States, Pakistan was swept by rumours that he had been toppled in a military coup. While Musharraf called it "nonsense", newspapers saw the public's readiness to believe the talk as a clear sign of Pakistanis' insecurity.
"That rumours of a coup should spread within hours from one end of the country to the other indicates that many people still do not feel confident about the stability of the political system despite repeated assurances that the way to military coup has been barred forever," the Nation daily wrote in an editorial.
"The system set up by General Musharraf revolves around his person, and is in itself a source of perennial instability."
The book sparked controversy even before its launch, when Musharraf told an American television interviewer that former US Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage had warned that Pakistan would be bombed "back to the Stone Age" if it failed to help Washington avenge Al Qaida's September 11, 2001 attacks.
The United States denied the claim and analysts said such remarks were unhelpful for Pakistan's relations with Washington.
"Such remarks may well sell your book but it creates more controversies," Asad Durrani, former head of Inter-Services Intelligence, the country's top spy agency, said. "I don't see any good impact on relations because of this book, rather it could harm them."
Analysts also voiced concern about a sitting president writing about security issues and relations with other countries.
His questioning of Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's approach to peace process and Afghanistan's growing complaints about cross-border incursions of the Taliban are likely to cast a negative impact on relations with neighbours.
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