ISLAMABAD // Pakistan announced on Sunday it would put Pervez Musharraf on trial for treason for imposing emergency rule in 2007.

If convicted, the country’s former military ruler could face the death penalty or life in prison.

“Following the judgement of the supreme court and a report submitted by an inquiry committee, it has been decided to start proceedings against General Pervez Musharraf under Article 6 of the Constitution,” said Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan, the interior minister, during a televised press conference.

“It is happening for the first time in the history of Pakistan and the decision has been taken in the national interest.”

The minister said the country’s chief justice would on Monday receive a letter from the government requesting the setting-up of a tribunal of three high court judges to start proceedings against Mr Musharraf.

The government would also announce a special prosecutor on Monday.

Mr Musharraf is already facing four major criminal cases dating back to his 1999-2008 rule, including one related to the assassination of the former prime minister Benazir Bhutto in 2007.

Last week he asked a court to let him leave the country to visit his sick mother in Dubai. The court was expected to rule on the application on Monday.

There have been rumours in recent months that a deal would be reached for Mr Musharraf to leave Pakistan without going through with his trials.

Mr Khan insisted that the government’s decision to put the former president on trial for treason was not a personal vendetta by the prime minister, Nawaz Sharif, who was toppled in a military coup by Mr Musharraf in 1999.

In November 2007 Mr Musharraf imposed emergency rule, suspending the constitution and parliament and sacking top judges who declared his actions unconstitutional and illegal.

Mr Musharraf technically became a free man this month when an Islamabad district court granted him bail over a deadly raid on a radical mosque in the capital in 2007.

His return to Pakistan in March was far from the triumphant occasion he had hoped for.

He was barred from contesting the general election, which was won convincingly by Mr Sharif for his third term as prime minister, and was hit with a series of criminal cases dating back to his rule.

Apart from the mosque raid, he faces charges over Bhutto’s murder at an election rally in 2007, the death of a Baluch rebel leader in 2006 and the detention of judges in 2007.

He was put under house arrest in April, an unprecedented move against a former army chief in a country where the military holds huge power.

* Agence France-Presse with additional reporting by Associated Press