![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
icarusThey killed Bhutto.
Everything in bold is my own editorializing. Including the conga line.
RAWALPINDI, Pakistan - Pakistan opposition leader Benazir Bhutto was assassinated Thursday by an attacker who slipped through Musharraf's flimsy security and shot her after a campaign rally and then blew himself up. Her death stoked new chaos across the nuclear-armed nation, important as one of the few remaining U.S. allies in the war on terrorism bought and paid for with F-16s.
At least 20 others were also killed in the attack on the rally for Jan. 8 parliamentary elections where the 54-year-old former prime minister had just spoken.
Her supporters erupted in anger and grief after her killing, attacking probably complicit police and burning tires and Musharraf's election campaign posters in several cities. At the hospital where she died, some smashed glass and wailed, chanting slogans against President Pervez Musharraf. One person was killed in the violent aftermath of the assassination.
Musharraf conveniently blamed Islamic extremists for Bhutto's death and said he would redouble his efforts to fight them instead of conducting an investigation.
"This is the work of those terrorists with whom we are engaged in war," he said in an immediate indirection in a nationally televised speech. "I have been saying that the nation faces the greatest threats from these terrorists. ... We will not rest until we eliminate these terrorists and root them out." Never mind that the unpopular president had the most to gain from her death.
In the U.S., a tense looking President Bush strongly condemned the attack if not the attackers "by murderous extremists who are trying to undermine Pakistan's democracy." In one sentence, the U.S. tucked tail and ran, despite the fact the it was the U.S. that insisted Musharraf allow Bhutto back into the country where she was immediately put under house arrest some months ago.
Musharraf convened an emergency meeting with his senior staff, where they were expected to throw a party and discuss whether to postpone the elections for the coronation of Musharraf in an "I so rule" paper hat, an official at the Interior Ministry said, speaking on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the talks and because he didn't want to lose his place in the conga line.
Nawaz Sharif, another former prime minister and opposition leader, said his party would boycott the elections unless he, too, gets a paper hat and gets to lead Musharraf around on a dog leash.
The attacker struck just minutes after Bhutto addressed thousands of supporters in the garrison city of Rawalpindi, 8 miles south of Islamabad. She was expertly shot in the neck next to her spinal cord, and chest by the sharp-shooter attacker, who then blew himself up, said Rehman Malik, Bhutto's security adviser.
Sardar Qamar Hayyat, a leader from Bhutto's party, said he was standing about 10 yard away from her vehicle at the time of the attack.
"She was inside the vehicle and was coming out from the gate after addressing the rally when some of the youths started chanting slogans in her favor. Then I saw a smiling Bhutto emerging from the vehicle's roof and responding to their slogans," he said.
"Then I saw a thin, young man jumping toward her vehicle from the back and opening fire. Moments later, I saw her speeding vehicle going away," he added.
Bhutto was rushed to the hospital and taken into emergency surgery. She died about an hour after the attack.
A doctor on the team that treated her said she had a bullet in the back of the neck that damaged her spinal cord before exiting from the side of her head. Another bullet pierced the back of her shoulder and came out through her chest. He held up a coin. "See this silver dollar? If I throw it up in the air and you shoot it through the middle, that is how difficult it is to hit this spot. But I'm not saying the shooter is military trained, oh no."
She was given open heart massage, but the main cause of death was damage to her spinal cord, he said on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media and he didn't want to die.
"At 6:16 p.m., she expired," said Wasif Ali Khan, a member of Bhutto's party who was at Rawalpindi General Hospital.
"The surgeons confirmed that she has been martyred," Bhutto's lawyer Babar Awan said, hoping to set Musharraf's paper hat on fire.
Bhutto's supporters at the hospital exploded in anger, smashing the glass door at the main entrance of the emergency unit. Others burst into tears. One man with a flag of Bhutto's Pakistan People's Party tied around his head was beating his chest.
"I saw her with my own eyes sitting in a vehicle after addressing the rally. Then, I heard an explosion," Tahir Mahmood, 55, said sobbing. "I am in shock. I cannot believe that she is dead."
Many chanted slogans against Musharraf, intelligently accusing him of complicity in her killing.
"We repeatedly informed the government to provide her proper security and appropriate equipment ... but they paid no heed to our requests," Malik said, holding up a paper "bullet-proof vest" with concentric red circles painted on the chest area.
As news of her death spread, angry supporters took to the streets.
In Karachi, shop owners said, "Yipe!" and quickly closed their businesses as protesters set tires on fire on the roads, torched several vehicles and burned a gas station, said Fayyaz Leghri, a local police official. Gunmen shot and wounded two police officers, he said.
One man was killed in a shootout between police and protesters in Tando Allahyar, a town 120 miles north of Karachi, said Mayor Kanwar Naveed. In the town of Tando Jam, protesters forced passengers to get out of a train and then set it on fire in lieu of the paper hat.
Violence also broke out in Lahore, Multan, Peshawar and many other parts of Pakistan, where Bhutto's supporters burned banks, state-run grocery stores and private shops. Some set fire to election offices for the ruling party, according to Pakistani media.
Akhtar Zamin, home minister for the southern Sindh province, said authorities would deploy troops to stop violence and crush any remaining opposition if needed.
Musharraf, who announced three days of mourning for Bhutto, urged calm.
"I want to appeal to the nation to remain peaceful and exercise restraint," he said, wearing a black mask and long black cape. "Or else I will destroy the remaining Jedis."
Sharif arrived at the hospital and sat silently next to Bhutto's body.
"Benazir Bhutto was also my sister, and I will be with you to take the revenge for her death," he said, giving the "all systems go" for sharp-shooters to take out Musharraf. "Don't feel alone. I am with you. We will take the revenge on the rulers."
He rebutted suggestions that he could gain political capital from her demise, announcing his Muslim League-N party would boycott the elections and demanding that Musharraf resign, wear diapers, put on that dog collar they mailed to his address, and grovel at his feet begging eternal forgiveness.
"The holding of fair and free elections is not possible in the presence of 'Pervy' Pervez Musharraf," he said. "After the killing of Benazir Bhutto, I announce that the Pakistan Muslim League-N will boycott the elections," he told a news conference.
"I demand that Musharraf should quit immediately," he added.
Hours earlier, four people were killed at a rally for Sharif when his supporters clashed with backers of Musharraf near Rawalpindi.
Bhutto's death will leave a void at the top of her party, the largest political group in the country, as it heads into the elections.
Pakistan is considered a vital U.S. ally in the fight against al-Qaida and other Islamic extremists including the Taliban. Osama bin Laden and his inner circle are believed to be hiding in lawless northwest Pakistan along the border with Afghanistan.
The U.S. has invested significant diplomatic capital, cash and prizes in promoting reconciliation between Musharraf and the opposition, particularly Bhutto, who was seen as having a wide base of support in Pakistan. As one can see, it was a resounding success. Her party had been widely expected to do well in next month's elections, and by well, we mean mop the floor with Musharraf and hang him on the clothesline to dry.
Had the PPP either won a majority of seats or enough to put together a majority coalition, the U.S. had desperately wanted Bhutto to recaptured the job of prime minister.
Bush, speaking briefly to reporters at his ranch in Crawford, Texas, helplessly demanded that those responsible for the killing be brought to justice.
"The United States strongly condemns this cowardly act by murderous extremists who are trying to undermine Pakistan's democracy," said Bush, who looked tense and took no questions, though aides on condition of anonymity say his first response was "Oh, shit."
Pakistan was just emerging from another crisis after Musharraf declared a state of emergency on Nov. 3 3.5 seconds after Bhutto arrived in his country, and used sweeping powers to round up Bhutto, thousands of his opponents, and fire Supreme Court justices who had told him, "Hey, wait, you can't do that." He ended emergency rule Dec. 15 and subsequently relinquished his role as army chief, a key opposition demand. Bhutto had been an outspoken critic of Musharraf's imposition of emergency rule from her house arrest surrounded by Musharraf's armed guards "for her protection."
Educated at Harvard and Oxford universities, Bhutto served twice as Pakistan's prime minister between 1988 and 1996.
Her father was Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, scion of a wealthy landowning family in southern Pakistan and founder of the populist Pakistan People's Party. The elder Bhutto was president and then prime minister of Pakistan before his ouster in a 1977 military coup. Two years later, he was executed by the government of Gen. Zia-ul Haq after being convicted of engineering the murder of a political opponent.
Bhutto had returned to Pakistan from an eight-year exile on Oct. 18. On the same day, she narrowly escaped injury when her homecoming parade in Karachi was targeted in a suicide attack that killed more than 140 people.
Islamic militants linked to al-Qaida and the Taliban hated Bhutto for her close ties to the Americans and support for the war on terrorism. A local Taliban leader reportedly threatened to greet Bhutto's return to the country with suicide bombings.
At the scene of Thursday's bombing, an Associated Press reporter saw body parts and flesh scattered at the back gate of the Liaqat Bagh park, where Bhutto had spoken. He counted about 20 bodies, including police, and could see many other wounded people.
Police cordoned off the street with white and red tape, and rescuers rushed to put victims in ambulances as people wailed nearby.
The clothing of some victims was shredded and people put party flags over their bodies. Police caps and shoes littered the asphalt.
Hundreds of riot police had manned security checkpoints around the venue. It was Bhutto's first public meeting in Rawalpindi since she came back to the country.
In November, Bhutto had also planned a rally in the city, but Musharraf forced her to cancel it, citing security fears.
In recent weeks, suicide bombers have repeatedly targeted security forces in Rawalpindi, where Musharraf stays and the Pakistan army has its headquarters.
Bush is reported to have asked today, "Does she have a sister?"
Everything in bold is my own editorializing. Including the conga line.
Pakistan's Bhutto killed in attack
RAWALPINDI, Pakistan - Pakistan opposition leader Benazir Bhutto was assassinated Thursday by an attacker who slipped through Musharraf's flimsy security and shot her after a campaign rally and then blew himself up. Her death stoked new chaos across the nuclear-armed nation, important as one of the few remaining U.S. allies in the war on terrorism bought and paid for with F-16s.
At least 20 others were also killed in the attack on the rally for Jan. 8 parliamentary elections where the 54-year-old former prime minister had just spoken.
Her supporters erupted in anger and grief after her killing, attacking probably complicit police and burning tires and Musharraf's election campaign posters in several cities. At the hospital where she died, some smashed glass and wailed, chanting slogans against President Pervez Musharraf. One person was killed in the violent aftermath of the assassination.
Musharraf conveniently blamed Islamic extremists for Bhutto's death and said he would redouble his efforts to fight them instead of conducting an investigation.
"This is the work of those terrorists with whom we are engaged in war," he said in an immediate indirection in a nationally televised speech. "I have been saying that the nation faces the greatest threats from these terrorists. ... We will not rest until we eliminate these terrorists and root them out." Never mind that the unpopular president had the most to gain from her death.
In the U.S., a tense looking President Bush strongly condemned the attack if not the attackers "by murderous extremists who are trying to undermine Pakistan's democracy." In one sentence, the U.S. tucked tail and ran, despite the fact the it was the U.S. that insisted Musharraf allow Bhutto back into the country where she was immediately put under house arrest some months ago.
Musharraf convened an emergency meeting with his senior staff, where they were expected to throw a party and discuss whether to postpone the elections for the coronation of Musharraf in an "I so rule" paper hat, an official at the Interior Ministry said, speaking on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the talks and because he didn't want to lose his place in the conga line.
Nawaz Sharif, another former prime minister and opposition leader, said his party would boycott the elections unless he, too, gets a paper hat and gets to lead Musharraf around on a dog leash.
The attacker struck just minutes after Bhutto addressed thousands of supporters in the garrison city of Rawalpindi, 8 miles south of Islamabad. She was expertly shot in the neck next to her spinal cord, and chest by the sharp-shooter attacker, who then blew himself up, said Rehman Malik, Bhutto's security adviser.
Sardar Qamar Hayyat, a leader from Bhutto's party, said he was standing about 10 yard away from her vehicle at the time of the attack.
"She was inside the vehicle and was coming out from the gate after addressing the rally when some of the youths started chanting slogans in her favor. Then I saw a smiling Bhutto emerging from the vehicle's roof and responding to their slogans," he said.
"Then I saw a thin, young man jumping toward her vehicle from the back and opening fire. Moments later, I saw her speeding vehicle going away," he added.
Bhutto was rushed to the hospital and taken into emergency surgery. She died about an hour after the attack.
A doctor on the team that treated her said she had a bullet in the back of the neck that damaged her spinal cord before exiting from the side of her head. Another bullet pierced the back of her shoulder and came out through her chest. He held up a coin. "See this silver dollar? If I throw it up in the air and you shoot it through the middle, that is how difficult it is to hit this spot. But I'm not saying the shooter is military trained, oh no."
She was given open heart massage, but the main cause of death was damage to her spinal cord, he said on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media and he didn't want to die.
"At 6:16 p.m., she expired," said Wasif Ali Khan, a member of Bhutto's party who was at Rawalpindi General Hospital.
"The surgeons confirmed that she has been martyred," Bhutto's lawyer Babar Awan said, hoping to set Musharraf's paper hat on fire.
Bhutto's supporters at the hospital exploded in anger, smashing the glass door at the main entrance of the emergency unit. Others burst into tears. One man with a flag of Bhutto's Pakistan People's Party tied around his head was beating his chest.
"I saw her with my own eyes sitting in a vehicle after addressing the rally. Then, I heard an explosion," Tahir Mahmood, 55, said sobbing. "I am in shock. I cannot believe that she is dead."
Many chanted slogans against Musharraf, intelligently accusing him of complicity in her killing.
"We repeatedly informed the government to provide her proper security and appropriate equipment ... but they paid no heed to our requests," Malik said, holding up a paper "bullet-proof vest" with concentric red circles painted on the chest area.
As news of her death spread, angry supporters took to the streets.
In Karachi, shop owners said, "Yipe!" and quickly closed their businesses as protesters set tires on fire on the roads, torched several vehicles and burned a gas station, said Fayyaz Leghri, a local police official. Gunmen shot and wounded two police officers, he said.
One man was killed in a shootout between police and protesters in Tando Allahyar, a town 120 miles north of Karachi, said Mayor Kanwar Naveed. In the town of Tando Jam, protesters forced passengers to get out of a train and then set it on fire in lieu of the paper hat.
Violence also broke out in Lahore, Multan, Peshawar and many other parts of Pakistan, where Bhutto's supporters burned banks, state-run grocery stores and private shops. Some set fire to election offices for the ruling party, according to Pakistani media.
Akhtar Zamin, home minister for the southern Sindh province, said authorities would deploy troops to stop violence and crush any remaining opposition if needed.
Musharraf, who announced three days of mourning for Bhutto, urged calm.
"I want to appeal to the nation to remain peaceful and exercise restraint," he said, wearing a black mask and long black cape. "Or else I will destroy the remaining Jedis."
Sharif arrived at the hospital and sat silently next to Bhutto's body.
"Benazir Bhutto was also my sister, and I will be with you to take the revenge for her death," he said, giving the "all systems go" for sharp-shooters to take out Musharraf. "Don't feel alone. I am with you. We will take the revenge on the rulers."
He rebutted suggestions that he could gain political capital from her demise, announcing his Muslim League-N party would boycott the elections and demanding that Musharraf resign, wear diapers, put on that dog collar they mailed to his address, and grovel at his feet begging eternal forgiveness.
"The holding of fair and free elections is not possible in the presence of 'Pervy' Pervez Musharraf," he said. "After the killing of Benazir Bhutto, I announce that the Pakistan Muslim League-N will boycott the elections," he told a news conference.
"I demand that Musharraf should quit immediately," he added.
Hours earlier, four people were killed at a rally for Sharif when his supporters clashed with backers of Musharraf near Rawalpindi.
Bhutto's death will leave a void at the top of her party, the largest political group in the country, as it heads into the elections.
Pakistan is considered a vital U.S. ally in the fight against al-Qaida and other Islamic extremists including the Taliban. Osama bin Laden and his inner circle are believed to be hiding in lawless northwest Pakistan along the border with Afghanistan.
The U.S. has invested significant diplomatic capital, cash and prizes in promoting reconciliation between Musharraf and the opposition, particularly Bhutto, who was seen as having a wide base of support in Pakistan. As one can see, it was a resounding success. Her party had been widely expected to do well in next month's elections, and by well, we mean mop the floor with Musharraf and hang him on the clothesline to dry.
Had the PPP either won a majority of seats or enough to put together a majority coalition, the U.S. had desperately wanted Bhutto to recaptured the job of prime minister.
Bush, speaking briefly to reporters at his ranch in Crawford, Texas, helplessly demanded that those responsible for the killing be brought to justice.
"The United States strongly condemns this cowardly act by murderous extremists who are trying to undermine Pakistan's democracy," said Bush, who looked tense and took no questions, though aides on condition of anonymity say his first response was "Oh, shit."
Pakistan was just emerging from another crisis after Musharraf declared a state of emergency on Nov. 3 3.5 seconds after Bhutto arrived in his country, and used sweeping powers to round up Bhutto, thousands of his opponents, and fire Supreme Court justices who had told him, "Hey, wait, you can't do that." He ended emergency rule Dec. 15 and subsequently relinquished his role as army chief, a key opposition demand. Bhutto had been an outspoken critic of Musharraf's imposition of emergency rule from her house arrest surrounded by Musharraf's armed guards "for her protection."
Educated at Harvard and Oxford universities, Bhutto served twice as Pakistan's prime minister between 1988 and 1996.
Her father was Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, scion of a wealthy landowning family in southern Pakistan and founder of the populist Pakistan People's Party. The elder Bhutto was president and then prime minister of Pakistan before his ouster in a 1977 military coup. Two years later, he was executed by the government of Gen. Zia-ul Haq after being convicted of engineering the murder of a political opponent.
Bhutto had returned to Pakistan from an eight-year exile on Oct. 18. On the same day, she narrowly escaped injury when her homecoming parade in Karachi was targeted in a suicide attack that killed more than 140 people.
Islamic militants linked to al-Qaida and the Taliban hated Bhutto for her close ties to the Americans and support for the war on terrorism. A local Taliban leader reportedly threatened to greet Bhutto's return to the country with suicide bombings.
At the scene of Thursday's bombing, an Associated Press reporter saw body parts and flesh scattered at the back gate of the Liaqat Bagh park, where Bhutto had spoken. He counted about 20 bodies, including police, and could see many other wounded people.
Police cordoned off the street with white and red tape, and rescuers rushed to put victims in ambulances as people wailed nearby.
The clothing of some victims was shredded and people put party flags over their bodies. Police caps and shoes littered the asphalt.
Hundreds of riot police had manned security checkpoints around the venue. It was Bhutto's first public meeting in Rawalpindi since she came back to the country.
In November, Bhutto had also planned a rally in the city, but Musharraf forced her to cancel it, citing security fears.
In recent weeks, suicide bombers have repeatedly targeted security forces in Rawalpindi, where Musharraf stays and the Pakistan army has its headquarters.
Bush is reported to have asked today, "Does she have a sister?"
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2007-12-28 12:02 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-12-28 12:13 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-12-28 12:22 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-12-28 05:53 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-12-28 12:18 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-12-28 01:06 am (UTC)After the last assassination attempt that failed I thought it was likely that they would try again, but just hoped against hope that she would survive again. Oh how awful.
This Christmas just seems to have had the worst run of bad news I have heard of. We had a father bashed to death while playing beach cricket with his kids on Christmas day near us, another guy drowned, there was that tiger thing in the US and that family that was all shot and big mudslides in Indonesia and now this. :(
no subject
Date: 2007-12-28 01:15 am (UTC)Her public appearances were canceled and it was clear once Musharraf put her under house arrest and declared a state of emergency that fear of the U.S. reaction wasn't enough to keep him from taking action. Yes, she wanted to go back, but we used her, or hoped to use her, and grossly misjudged our power -- yet again.
The tiger attack, the drowning -- these other things were accidents. This was not an accident, nor was it unforeseeable. The U.S. has culpability in this assassination.
no subject
Date: 2007-12-28 05:54 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-12-28 02:32 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-12-28 06:53 pm (UTC)Pakistan's been a U.S. ally longer than India. Generally speaking, Pakistan has relied on the U.S. for decades for military hardware. Everything they've got is American -- and if I recall, they don't license manufacture. They need us. India on the other hand, has always avoided being under the U.S. wing, buying from the Russians, the French, insisting on license manufacturing everything (i.e. being given permission to build it themselves).
Don't fall for the oversimplification that every Muslim country is anti-U.S. What's going on in Pakistan is that the country is broken into three general groups (a gazillion parties and interests, but they fall into these three): the military, the wealthy businessmen from one particular region that gets all the government money, and the outlying areas of the country, which are completely ignored.
Pakistan's problems come from the fact that the outlying areas, which represent over half the country, have no schools, no infrastructure, no real roads, if I have this right, they rely on generators, they've no sewage systsm -- they're totally undeveloped.
The wealthy businessmen, when they're in power, have been completely corrupt. They help themselves to the cash and it's a giveaway to their friends. I liked Bhutto, but both she and her father were removed from power due to corruption. The other faction is the military which, amazingly, tends to be less corrupt but the military leaders have consistently chipped away at constitutional rights... and of course, spent more and more on defense out of fear of India.
In the meantime, Pakistan treats the people as if the Punjab are the only ones that matters. If I were to draw a map of Pakistan, I would make a clear border between Pakistan and India, and then in the northwest I'd make this fuzzy area that Pakistan's never done anything for, so doesn't control.
Pakistan totally deserves its "extremists" and it'll have them until it starts to do something for the average Joe. Or average Muhammad, in this case.
But these people are dirt poor and I seriously doubt that they assassinated Bhutto. They didn't like her, but the suicide bombings for the last few months have been against Musarraf. I can't picture them taking out his most powerful competition right before the election.
No. Musarraf used the "extremists" as a cover and had someone from the military assassinate her. That was an expert hit, followed unnecessarily by a bomb.
no subject
Date: 2007-12-28 07:04 pm (UTC)...and my comments today have all been frustratingly cryptic due to the cold medication having its way with my mind.
no subject
Date: 2007-12-28 07:58 pm (UTC)This whole "Al Qaeda" thing is getting ridiculous. They might as well say it's the bogey man.
no subject
Date: 2007-12-28 07:15 pm (UTC)Despite the fact that it would so totally *not* have been in their interests to do so. Basically now, *any* violent attack is done by terrorists and all terrorists are Al-Qaeda. Right? Thus justifying the "War on Terror" that has made the world a much less safe place to be.
Bhutto may well have been on the take during her time in office. In that part of the world it's almost a given for any politician. (And of course, it never happens here. *coughs*)She didn't deserve to die like that, nor did those bystanders who got taken out as well.
*sighs*
Thanks for the article.
no subject
Date: 2007-12-28 08:10 pm (UTC)The headlines here -- today -- are just as bad. Only if you read the articles do you get the info that Musarraf is blaming
the bogeymanAl Qaeda, but that Bhutto's supporters (and, oh, all of Pakistan...) blame Musarraf.no subject
Date: 2007-12-29 05:39 pm (UTC)Progress, of a sort.The rest of the papers seem to have relegated the whole thing somewhere behind the latest Madeleine McCann News, or which alleged celeb is doing who(m). Which would be why I don't really buy papers anymore.
no subject
Date: 2007-12-29 07:22 pm (UTC)Then there's this article (http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20071229/ap_on_re_as/pakistan) there the Bhutto aides blame Musharraf, and the militants blamed by Musharraf say, "Nope. It wasn't us."