Pakistan Taliban claims it killed Benazir Bhutto

International Desk: A recent book by a senior Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) leader claims that his group was behind the 2007 assassination of Pakistan’s first woman Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto.

The new book, ‘Inqilab Mehsood South Waziristan: From British Raj to American Imperialism,’ was released on Nov 30, 2017, and written by Abu Mansoor Asim Mufti Noor Wali, a senior leader in the Taliban terror group.

Arab News has obtained a copy of the 588-page online book.

Benazir Bhutto was assassinated in the garrison city of Rawalpindi shortly after she addressed an election rally on December 27, 2007.

According to the book author, two suicide bombers, Bilal alias Saeed and Ikramullah, were assigned to carry out the attack on Benazir Bhutto on December 27.

“Bomber Bilal first fired at Benazir Bhutto from his pistol and the bullet hit her neck. Then he detonated his explosive vest and blew up people in the procession,” the book says.

The book adds that the terrorist Taliban group was also involved in the suicide attack on Benazir Bhutto’s procession in Karachi October 2007, which had killed nearly 140 people, but Benazir had survived.

“Despite attacks on Benazir Bhutto’s procession in Karachi, the government had not taken appropriate security measures that made it possible for the attackers to have easy access to Benazir Bhutto,” the book says.

A former Taliban leader confirmed to Arab News that the book has written by the group.

Then President Pervez Musharraf had blamed TTP for the attack on Benazir Bhutto, and the Ministry of Interior, after the incident, released an audio conversation and said it was between the two men who were assigned to kill Benazir Bhutto.

In August 2017 an anti-terrorism court (ATC) in Rawalpindi formally charged Musharraf in the case of Benazir Bhutto assassination and declared him “most wanted” in the case.

But Musharraf denied any involvement and dismissed the charges as politically-motivated.

The five TTP suspects in Benazir’s murder case — Rafaqat Hussain, Husnain Gul, Sher Zaman, Aitzaz Shah and Abdul Rashid — were cleared of all charges in the murder trial in August last year.

The book covers the TTP’s history, its attacks, military operations in the tribal regions, TTP’s activities in Afghanistan, tribal system, Mehsood tribe role in the TTP, TTP operations in Karachi and its campaign against polio vaccination.

Pakistan Peoples Party co-chairman Bilawal Bhutto, and the son of Benazir Bhutto, blamed Musharraf for his mother’s assassination on her 10th death anniversary on Dec. 27, last year.

Pakistan Peoples Party’s spokesperson Farhatullah Babar said the Taliban claim has strengthened the party’s suspicion that the militants had been “used to execute the terrorist act.”

“In fact we have been demanding to know who were the masterminds behind the plan to martyr Benazir Bhutto,” Babar told Arab News.

“Whoever the mastermind might have been they should be exposed. They had in fact used these people (Taliban) to execute the plan,” the PPP leader added.

Source: Agencies


risingbd/Dhaka/Jan 15, 2018/AI