David L. Chaplin II
Impunity Watch, Asia
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan – Two senior police officials were arrested Wednesday in connection with the assassination of former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto. A court refused bail for the two officials, Saud Aziz and his assistant Khurram Shehzad, said special public prosecutor Chaudhary Zulfiqar Ali. Aziz, the police chief in the Rawalpindi district at the time of Bhutto’s assassination, was the head of her security team. The two police officials are scheduled to appear for a hearing January 7.
Bhutto returning from a self-imposed, eight-year exile to running in the country’s general elections in 2007, to later escape an attempt on her life but was subsequently killed on December 27 by a 15-year-old suicide bomber while campaigning for parliament in Rawalpindi.
Security breaches and allegations of covering up are the charges. The actions which bring their condemnation are the hosing down of the crime scene and failing to conduct a post-mortem examination on Bhutto.
The attorney for the two officials argued that Bhutto’s husband, Asif Ali Zardari, the current president, had asked the police not to carry out a post-mortem. Evidence of this conversation, via audio of that request, was played in court Wednesday.
The court decided that both men failed their legal obligations as officers of the law. Five suspected militants are already facing trial for alleged involvement in Ms. Bhutto’s murder.
A Pakistani government investigation blamed the then top leader of the Taliban in Pakistan, Baitullah Mehsud. He denied being involved in the assassination and was killed in a suspected US missile attack in August 2009.
It was the United Nations panel and their insight into Bhutto’s assassination which came to the conclusion that Pakistan’s military-led former government failed to sufficiently protect her and the intelligence agencies stalled the ensuing investigation.
The panel’s report in April said the suicide bombing which killed Bhutto “could have been prevented” and also that police deliberately failed in pursuit of an effective investigation into the killings.
The government of Gen. Pervez Musharraf rejects the allegations saying that Bhutto had in fact been afforded adequate protection.
“No one believes that this boy acted alone,” the U.N. report said. “A range of government officials failed profoundly in their efforts first to protect Ms. Bhutto, and second to investigate with vigor all those responsible for her murder, not only in the execution of the attack, but also in its conception, planning and financing.”
Bhutto’s family, including Zardari, said they suspected some elements in Pakistan’s intelligence agencies might have been involved in the assassination.
Police said they had earlier arrested five suspects in connection with Bhutto’s murder. Almost all of them are alleged to have been associated with the local Taliban fighting government forces in the country’s tribal region along the Afghan border.
Bhutto had taken a firm stand against Taliban militants before she returned to Pakistan in October 2007, ending a decade of self-imposed exile to take part in elections.
For more information, please see:
CNN – Two police offiicials arrested in Bhutto assassination – 22 December 2010
BBC – Pakistan police detained over Benazir Bhutto murder – 22 December
Sify News – Two police officers arrested in Bhutto murder case – 22 December
