Altaf offers condolences to Zardari

Muttahida Qaumi Movement leader Altaf Hussain called Pakistan People’s Party co-chairman Asif Ali Zardari and offered condolences on the tragic death of Benazir Bhutto.

A press release of MQM issued on Monday said that Mr Hussain described the death of Ms Bhutto a national loss.

He said that he and every worker of the MQM had been saddened by this incident.

Mr Hussain asked Mr Zardari to convey his condolences to Bilawal, Bakhtawar and Aseefa and other members of the family.

He said that in the past through conspiracies “we were pitted against each other but now we understand this”.

He said time had come to recognise such elements and work jointly for betterment of the Sindh province and the country.

Mr Zardari thanked Mr Hussain for offering condolences and agreed that misunderstandings had been created in the past, and that “we will work together for the betterment of

BB’s relative killed in accident

Four people, including wife of Benazir Bhutto’s first cousin Imdad Ali Bhutto, died in a road accident on the Indus Highway near the Cadet College Petaro on Monday.

Mehdi Raza Bhutto, the son of Imdad Ali Bhutto, told Dawn that his mother Shabnam Naheed Bhutto, was returning from Larkana after attending Benazir Bhutto’s soyem when her vehicle collided with a truck.

The other victims in the accident are Rasool Bux Korejo, Haji Rabban Korejo and the driver.

RAWALPINDI, Dec 27: An assassin’s bullet killed Benazir Bhutto on Thursday in what the government described as a gun-and-bomb suicide attack immediately after the former prime minister had addressed an election rally of her Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) at Rawalpindi’s Liaquat Bagh park.

The attack targeting Pakistan’s most prominent opposition leader, which also killed at least 21 other people and wounded about 60, dealt a new shock to a world already troubled by political terrorism and clouded the process of the general election set for Jan 8 and the country’s political future.

Ms Bhutto was driving out of the park after speaking to a big election rally when, according to witnesses and police officials, the attacker struck first with gunfire and then blew himself up possibly with an explosive device strapped to his body.

Witnesses said they first heard four or five gunshots as Ms Bhutto appeared from the sun-roof of her white bullet-proof four-wheel drive Toyota Landcruiser to wave to her followers chanting “jiay Bhutto (long live Bhutto) outside the northern gate of the park, and then saw her disappearing into the vehicle before a big explosion damaged the jeep rear and turned the scene into a killing ground. Hardly anybody at the scene seemed to know at the time she had been hit by bullets and driven to the Rawalpindi General Hospital, where she was later pronounced dead at an operation theatre table.

Both security officials and PPP members said they had heard the gunshots but that Ms Bhutto was safe as reporters witnessed ambulances lifting the dead and wounded from a blood-splattered portion of Liaquat Road outside the park gate that was reserved on the day for the entry and exit of the PPP leader and her close associates.

Limbs of the victims were scattered in the area, including what was presumed to be the remnant of the head of the unidentified suicide bomber that looked like a lump of flesh when it was al ready turning dark.

While many people told reporters they did not know who fired the shots, at least one PPP student wing leader, Ayaz Khan Pappu, said he saw a man wearing shalwar-kamiz firing four shots at Ms Bhutto apparently from a 30bore pistol before being blown up by the blast of what a police bomb disposal squad official called a 5kg device.

PPP leader Makhdoom Amin Fahim, who was accompanying Ms Bhutto in the car along with her political secretary Naheed Khan, told a news conference later in Islamabad that he also heard four shots when the former prime minister was waving to the crowd from the vehicle’s sun-roof before slumping on her seat.

He said she would have remained safe if she had not looked out of the sun-roof.

Ms Bhutto was driven to hospital from Liaquat Bagh in her own Landcruiser though its tyres had burst because of the explosion, but was shifted mid-way to another vehicle, that of PPP information secretary Sherry Rehman.

Pappu, the president of the Rawalpindi city chapter of the PPP’s student wing — People’s Students Federation — who himself was wounded by a splinter on his forehead, told Dawn by telephone that people outside Ms Bhutto’s car did not know at the time she had been hit though some suspected “something” had happened and it was later at the hospital that he learnt the bullets hit her in the neck and a temple.

The attack happened 70 days after Ms Bhutto survived the first assassination attempt on Oct 18 when a bomb attack on a welcoming procession in Karachi on her return from more than eight years of self-exile abroad killed about 150 people.

It removed from the scene the last remaining bearer from her family of the political legacy of her father, former prime minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto who was exe cuted, also in Rawalpindi, on April 5, 1979 by the then-military ruler Gen Mohammad Ziaul Haq following a controversial conspiracy-to-murder conviction.

Her youngest brother Shahnawaz Bhutto was found mysteriously dead on July 18, 1985 while living in exile in a French Riviera apartment while his only other brother, Murtaza Bhutto, was killed in a mysterious shooting outside his home in Karachi on Sept 20, 1996.

Ms Bhutto’s mother, Nusrat, who led the PPP for some years after Gen Zia toppled Mr Bhutto in a 1977 coup, has been very ill in recent years and has been living in Dubai with her daughter.

Ms Bhutto’s husband Asif Ali Zardari never seemed prepared for a leadership role despite being elected to parliament and being a minister in her cabinet during the last of her two short-lived tenures as prime minister, while younger sister, Sanam, has not engaged in politics.

Shortly before the attack, the Liaquat Bagh gathering of tens of thousands repeatedly chanted “Prime Minister Benazir”, as an expression of the party intent to make her prime minister again despite a controversial decree enforced by President Pervez Musharraf to restrict prime ministerial tenures to only two.

But that was not destined to happen, despite the PPP’s hopes that if elected to power in the Jan 8 elections, it would undo the decree that also hits former prime minister Nawaz Sharif.

Mr Zardari and the couple’s three children — two daughters and a son — who have lived with their mother in Dubai since the beginning of her exile in 1999, arrived in Islamabad on Thursday night to accompany Ms Bhutto’s body to Larkana for burial on Friday at the family graveyard in Garhi Khuda Bux.

Just as Ms Bhutto’s body was lying in hospital, speculations were rife about the likelihood of a postponement of the elections.

Pakistan Muslim League-N leader Nawaz Sharif announced a boycott of the elections hours after the incident while the PPP announced a 40-day mourning during which it would be in no mood to contest the polls.

Benazir felled by assassin’s bullets; 21 others killed in suicide bombing(Dawn)

Resuscitation bid failed A REPORT sent by the Rawalpindi General Hospital to the Health Department of the Punjab provincial government said all efforts by its doctors to revive Ms Bhutto failed and she was declared dead ex- actly 41 minutes after she was brought at its emergency department at 5.35pm with open wounds on her left temporal bone from which “brain matter was exuding”. It said the PPP leader was not breathing at the time and her pulse and blood pressure “were not recordable”. The report said “immediate resuscitation (process) was started” and she was taken to the operation theatre where the same was done by a team of doctors headed by Prof Musaddiq Khan, principal of the Rawalpindi Medical College. “Left antrolateral thoracotomy for open cardiac massage was per- formed,” it said and added: “In spite of all the possible measures she could not be revived and (was) declared dead at 1816 (6.16pm) hours.” The report said a post-mortem examination of Ms Bhutto’s body was not carried out at the hospital “because the district administra- tion and police had not requested the hospital authorities (for this)”. Ms Bhutto was shot not far from where Pakistan’s first prime minis- ter Liaquat Ali Khan was killed by an assassin’s bullet on Oct 16, 1951.—Dawn Report

Biography

Benazir Bhutto (1953- ), Pakistani political leader, who served as first female prime minister of a Muslim country, she served for Pakistan from 1988 to 1990 and from 1993 to 1996. Born into a wealthy landholding family with a tradition of political activism in southeastern Sindh province, Bhutto enjoyed a privileged childhood

Bhutto was educated at Harvard's Radcliffe College in the United States and at the University of Oxford in England, where she excelled in studies as well as other activities including debating competitions, she was the first Asian woman to be elected president of the Oxford Union. The daughter of a intelligent and Charismatic Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto (1971-1977), she returned to Pakistan in june 1977, planning on a career in the foreign service. But only two weeks later, however, military officers led by General Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq , capitalizing on public protests of disputed parliamentary elections overthrew Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto in a bloodless coup. Benazir Bhutto spent the next eighteen months in and out of house arrest as she struggled to rally political support to force Zia to drop fallacious murder charges against her father. The military dictator ignored worldwide appeals for clemency and had Zulfikar Bhutto hanged in April of 1979.

Bhutto's persecution began in earnest after the dismissal of her father's government in 1977 and his execution in 1979 as she intensified her denunciations of Zia and sought to organize a political movement against him. Repeatedly put under house arrest, she was finally imprisoned under solitary confinement in a desert cell in Sindh province during the summer of 1981. Bhutto described the hellish conditions in her wall less cage in "Daughter of Destiny":

"The summer heat turned my cell into an oven. My skin split and peeled, coming off my hands in sheets. Boils erupted on my face. My hair, which had always been thick, began to come out by the handful. Insects crept into the cell like invading armies. Grasshoppers, mosquitoes, stinging flies, bees and bugs came up through the cracks in the floor and through the open bars from the courtyard. Big black ants, cockroaches, seething clumps of little red ants and spiders. I tried pulling the sheet over my head at night to hide from their bites, pushing it back when it got too hot to breathe."

Released in 1984, she went into exile in Britain until 1986, when martial law was lifted in Pakistan.She returned with a huge crowd numbering in the hundreds of thousands turned out on the streets to greet her, by then the leading symbol of the anti-Zia movement, when she returned to Lahore in April of 1986. Formally elected chair in the following month, Bhutto lost no time in organising mass protests and civil disobedience campaigns to pressure Zia to relinquish office and call national elections. Bhutto's stirring oratory, familiar name, and striking appearance helped give her a strong mass appeal, but she had to struggle to wrest real power from the PPP's old-guard leadership, members of which were wary of her gender, youth, and political wisdom. Supported by tumultuous crowds, Bhutto again called for fresh elections, resulting in another short prison term that same year. She also had to contend with internal dissension among the anti-Zia forces.

In 1988 Zia was killed in an airplane crash, less than three months after announcing that elections would take place. In the November elections the PPP gained a huge popularity in the National Assembly, and in December 1988 Bhutto, 35 only became prime minister of Pakistan, the first woman to hold this office in any modern Islamic state. During her first term, Her objective was to return Pakistan to civilian rule and oust the men who executed her father, she also started Peoples Program for economic uplift of the masses. Benazir Bhutto lifted a ban on student and trade unions. The PPP. Government hosted the fourth S. A. A. R. C. Summit held in Islamabad, in December 1988.

In August 1990, however, President Ghulam Ishaq Khan dismissed her, charging her with incompetence and corruption. ,The President and the Caretaker Prime Minister filed a series of references against Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto. Her husband, Mr. Asif Ali Zardari was arrested and imprisoned for over two years on a number of up charges.

Her party was soundly defeated in the elections that followed in November 1990, and Bhutto became an opposition leader in the parliament. Subsequent attempts to oust the ruling party resulted in Bhutto’s deportation to the city of Karachi in 1992, and she was temporarily banned from entering Islamabad, the capital of Pakistan.

Addressing at UN

In July 1993, the President of Pakistan dismissed the Government of Prime Minister Mian Nawaz Sharif on corruption charges and called for fresh elections. The Pakistan Peoples Party went to the people in October, 1993 with a new "Agenda for Change". The programme envisaged government at the door-step of the people and priority to the social sectors. Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto was again elected Prime Minister with a broad mandate after achieving strong popular support in all the four provinces of Pakistan .

Bhutto's platform has been leftist, including food for the hungry, health care, jobs, slum clearance and a monthly minimum wage.

She has been opposed by Islamic fundamentalists who have been suspicious of the PPP because of its alleged leftist.

Due to Benazir’s Personal world popularity, during her term Pakistan’s relation with other countries improved ,her moderate foreign policy had been credited for improving the wrong image of Pakistan around the world ,however domestically she and her party have been widely blamed for excessive corruption.

Benazir again faced trouble from the opposition. In the autumn of 1994, Nawaz Sharif led a "train march" from Karachi to Peshawar. This was followed by general strike on September 20. Two weeks later Nawaz Sharif called a "wheel jam" strike on October 11.

Bhutto was dismissed from office for the second time in late 1996. In October, large street demonstrations shut down the capital, and Bhutto aroused criticism when she had arrested several rival party leaders who had participated in the demonstrations.

Bhutto came under pressure from the press and public, who charged her government with corruption and mismanagement. On November 5, 1996, President of Pakistan Farooq Leghari dismissed Prime Minister Bhutto and dissolved the National Assembly.

Bhutto's husband, Zardari, was the focus of much of the criticism. She had appointed him to the cabinet post of investment minister. He was accused of taking bribes and pocketing money from government contracts. President Leghari also charged that Zardari was responsible for "extrajudicial killings" in Karachi, where Bhutto rivals had been killed by police.She denounced all charges as politically motivated, and went into self-imposed exile. In 2001 the Supreme Court of Pakistan suspended a high court’s 1999 conviction of Bhutto, ordering a retrial, but in a separate trial Bhutto was sentenced in absentia to three years in prison. She is currently still in self-exile in London and faces charges if she returns back.

She has been mentioned as "The world's most popular politician" in the New Guinness Book of Record 1996.

The "Times" and the "Australian Magazine" (May 4, 1996) have drawn up a list of 100 most powerful women and have included Benazir Bhutto as one of them.

She has received many honoury degrees and awards from several countries.

She also lectures and takes part in several major world events.



Publications

Benazir Bhutto is the author of two books "Foreign Policy in Perspective" (1978) and her autobiography, "Daughter of the East" (1989). Several collections of her speeches and works have been compiled which include "The Way Out", Pakistan Foreign Policy, Challenges and Responses in the Post-Cold War era in "After the Cold War" by Keith Philip Lepor and Male Domination of Women offends her Islamic religion in "Lend Me Your ears: Great Speeches in History" by William Saffire. "The Way Out" (1980). She has also contributed to many periodicals and to the books, "Predictions for the Next Millennium" by Kristof and Nickerson and "Book of Hopes and Dreams" published by Bookmaster Inc.

AWARDS AND HONORARY DRGREES

Bruno Kreisky Award of Merit in human Rights, 1988.

Honorary Phi Beta Kappa Award (1989), presented by Radcliffe College.

Highest Moroccan Award "Grand Cordon de Wissam Alaoui"

Highest French Award "Grand-croix de la Legion Honneur" (1989)

The Noel Foundation Award, 1990 (UNIFEM).

The Gakushuin Honorary Award, Tokyo (1996)

Award by the Turkish Independent Industries and Businessmen Association (MUSAID) on account of providing assistance to the people of Bosnia.

Golden medal Dragon of Bosnia awarded by President of Bosnia (1996)

Key to the city of Los Angeles, presented by the Mayor of Los Angeles (1995)

Presidential Medal, Paul Nitze School of Advanced International Science (1995)

Medal by University of California at Los Angeles (1995)

Honorary Doctorate of Law, L.L.D Harvard University (1989)

Honorary Doctorate of Law (Honoris Causa), University of Sindh (1994)

Honorary Doctorate from Mendanao State University, Philippines (1995)

Honorary Doctorate of Law (Honoris Causa), Peshawar University (1995)

Honorary Doctorate of Economics, Gakushuin University, Tokyo (1996)

Honorary Fellowship by Lady Margaret Hall, University Oxford, (1989)

Honorary Fellowship by St. Catherine College, University of Oxford, (1989)

Honorary Professor of the Kyrghyz State National University (1995) Kyrghyzstan.

Honorary Professor of Yassavi Kazakh Turkish University, Kazakh-Turkish International Language University, Kazakhstan, 1995.

Honorable Member of OHYUKAI, Alumni Association of Gakushuin, conferred by OHYUKAI Tokyo (1996).

Awarded the 2000 Millennium Medal of Honor by American Biographical Institute, Inc. in November 1998. Awarded American Academy Award of Achievement in London, October 28, 2000