Sharif returns to Pakistan from exile

LAHORE, Pakistan, Nov. 25 (UPI) -- Riot police in Lahore stood ready as nearly 2,000 supporters greeted former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif on his return Sunday to Pakistan from exile.

Thousands more Sharif supporters were stopped by police on the roads to Lahore as he arrived from Saudi Arabia after seven years in exile, the BBC reported. The Saudi royal family provide a private plane for the trip and a bullet-proof Mercedes for his use, the BBC reported.

Sharif was ousted in a bloodless coup in 1999 by Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf, who this month placed Pakistan under emergency rule.

Sharif said he and Musharraf remain "poles apart" in their political beliefs and there can be no reconciliation unless Musharraf returns Pakistan to constitutional rule and strengthens democracy, CNN reported.

Sharif told reporters he was in touch with Benazir Bhutto, another former prime minister and Musharraf critic whose return from exile last month was marked by two bombings that killed more than 130 people at her homecoming parade.