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Pictures show cool and calm assassins. These are not mountain terrorists but cold blooded, well trained killers.

A retired officer of the Pakistani military who has seen the original photographs within hours of the assassination has no doubt of linkages to foreign killers and their Pakistani accomplices inside Pakistan. The killers were both Pakistanis and foreigners.

By SIMON SAMSON SHARAF
Monday, 26 April 2010.
The Nation
Opinion Maker
WWW.PAKNATIONALISTS.COM

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan—As an observer watching the events of 27 December 2007 very closely and having seen the original photographs within hours of her death, I subscribe to the hypothesis that Benazir Bhutto was not a victim of any ragtag militants, but rather an international, well rehearsed plot with active cooperation from within Pakistan.

Not only was she eliminated in a fail safe operation, the crime scene was also washed immediately with emergency doctors becoming mum after their first exciting disclosures. Thereafter the story kept taking twists.

No one other than the Secretariat of PPP on Embassy Road Islamabad had the original and most incriminating video which they later handed over to Channel Four [UK] and some stills to DAWN TV. The video was taken by a Jiyala [party activist] sitting in a Pajero jeep immediately behind Benazir’s Land Cruiser. These pictures were up on the net within hours of her assassination and much before the ‘handle theory’ and the hosing down of the crime scene took place.

The assassin displayed remarkable cool. At least once, he chose to delay his fire and then moved in very close to an advantageous position with the bomber following him. The man who grappled and brought him down deserves a citation.

Benazir Bhutto, the Daughter of the East is dead, buried and treacherously abandoned by her party leadership. Some prime witnesses including the assassin himself, the suicide bomber, Khalid Shanshah, Baitullah Mehsud and God knows who else are silenced forever.

In the same stride, the nation must also know who murdered national leaders like Quaid-i-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah and his sister, Liaquat Ali, Bhutto, Ziaul Haq and Murtaza Bhutto.

Much before the UN investigation, every Pakistani was convinced that all investigations into the tragedy are deliberately misleading. Scotland Yard appears as much an accomplice in the cover-up as the Handle Theory. It appears that even the most incriminating video released by Channel Four through CNN and a Pakistan television network was deliberately blurred and edited to create confusion. This fact alone warrants expanding the ambit of inquiry to handlers outside Pakistan.

There is no doubt that Benazir was abandoned and left vulnerable by the state security apparatus and by her very own stalwarts.

Her chief of security merits inquest solely on the basis of his changing statements in the hours following her murder. As it turns out, he and Babar Awan were the ‘get away men’ who fled the scene in Benazir’s reserve vehicle. The most loyal Khalid Shahanshah who had probably lost that element during his visits abroad was the first to jump into Benazir’s vehicle and also to jump out and bolt to Zardari house, only to be gunned down in Karachi.

After Benazir’s rally security was stand-down. There were no senior police officers befitting the presence of a two-time prime minister and VVIP. The much touted Elite Force instructed to make a box bolted well before the murder. Stays behind parties were either blocking the turning to the left or mere spectators; some at their own peril rubbing shoulders with the suicide bomber and the shooter. There was no chivalry in their death.

The news broadcast by channels within the first two hours of the incident need to be replayed. There were eyewitness accounts by doctors of RGH that Benazir had received one to two fatal gunshot injuries. Suddenly everything changed and the doctors were made helpless by police and district administration. Even Sherry Rehman sings no more.

Cell phone communication through towers close to RGH will also reveal conversations of doctors and paramedics eagerly disclosing to friends and families the extent and type of Benazir’s injuries. By morning everyone including cell phones was quite and shift doctors quarantined.

Note:

A friend HP (Peter Hoss) made these comments:

TPM today reported that “CIA Assassin Program Could Operate Anywhere — Even inside U.S. This is a follow up on a story TPM ran earlier and WSJ reported too.
See CIA Had Secret Al Qaeda Plan and http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-yn/content/article/2009/07/15/AR2009071503856.html   

“We may have gotten a good piece of the answer here: The Washington Post reports today on how the program had been revived and then put on hold several times since 2001. But it also says, referring to the “presidential finding” with which President Bush authorized the program in 2001:

“The finding imposed no geographical limitations on the agency’s actions, and intelligence officials have said that they were not obliged to notify Congress of each operation envisaged under the directive.” [Click her to read report]

Seymour Hirsh a couple of months ago already commented that assassination squads were put in place by CIA under Cheney’s orders. Now the issue is the interpretation of “No geographical limitations” presumably means that operations could potentially be carried out in countries, friendly or unfriendly, that are far from any war zone — including even the US itself. And it seems likely that they would be carried out without notifying the foreign country in question.”

Read more at http://insight-and-foresight.blogspot.com/2009/07/was-benazir-bhutto-assasinated-through.html

This article combines an op-ed by the writer titled, The Pyre Must Burn published by The Nation and comments posted by the writer at Opinion Maker blog. The pictures were originally published by the Opinion Maker blog. The writer is a retired officer of Pakistan Army and a political economist. He can be reached at

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