By Arun Kumar, IANS
Washington : Two months before her assassination, former Pakistan prime minister Benazir Bhutto had sent an e-mail saying that if she were killed, Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf would bear some of the blame.
In the e-mail to her US adviser and long time friend Mark Siegel, she cited the Pakistan government’s denial of her request for additional security measures after the October suicide bombing that targeted her upon returning to Pakistan from exile, CNN reported.
“Nothing will, god willing, happen,” she wrote to her US spokesperson, lobbyist and friend. Siegel forwarded that e-mail to CNN’s Wolf Blitzer, with instructions he not report on it unless Bhutto was killed.
“Just wanted u to know if it does in addition to the names in my letter to Musharaf of Oct 16nth, I wld hold Musharaf responsible. I have been made to feel insecure by his minions and there is no way what is happening in terms of stopping me from taking private cars or using tinted windows or giving jammers or four police mobiles to cover all sides cld happen without him.”
Bhutto wrote the e-mail Oct 26, eight days after at least 130 people were killed and hundreds more wounded in Karachi by the suicide bombing that occurred as Bhutto’s motorcade passed.
Just before returning to Pakistan after eight years of self-imposed exile, Bhutto told CNN she was aware of threats against her and said that some had come from people who hold “high positions” in Pakistan’s government.
She said she had written a letter to Musharraf about her fears, apparently the same letter she refers to in her e-mail to Siegel, CNN said.
In a speech, she listed four groups she believed posed the biggest threat to her and her cause — the Taliban in Pakistan, the Taliban in Afghanistan, Al Qaeda and a suicide team from Karachi that she did not describe.
After the October bombing, she accused elements in the government and security services of trying to kill her and asked Musharraf for “basic security,” including vehicles with tinted windows and private guards in addition to police guards. Three US senators repeated the request in a letter to Musharraf.
Bhutto was concerned by the lack of security she had upon her arrival in Karachi and called the Oct 18 bombing “very suspicious”, Siegel said. He accused Pakistani authorities of not investigating the assassination attempt and of refusing Bhutto’s request for Scotland Yard and the FBI to aid in the investigation.
Bhutto and her husband had asked for jammers to impede the detonation of bombs; special vehicles with tinted windows; and four police vehicles to surround her at all times, Siegel said.
“She basically asked for all that was required for someone of the standing of a former prime minister,” Siegel told CNN’s “The Situation Room.” “All of that was denied to her… She got some police protection, but it was sporadic and erratic.”
Bhutto was concerned the problem was worsening as the January elections neared, Siegel said.
After the October attack, Bhutto said police offered to let her use a helicopter for the trip from the airport, but she told them she wanted to be near her people. She said she did not regret that decision.
“She believed in democracy, and she believed in speaking to the people,” Siegel said. “It’s not reckless to go out and touch the people. Don’t blame the victim for the crime. The person supposed to be protecting Benazir Bhutto and the other candidates was the government of Pakistan of Pervez Musharraf.”
At the same time, Siegel acknowledged, “She was moving almost in a sea of humanity,” he said. “No system in the world can protect you against that.”
Blitzer noted that Bhutto was shot Thursday while standing out of her vehicle’s sunroof — seen by some as a reckless action after the October incident.
Siegel grew emotional as he told Blitzer that Bhutto was “the bravest person I ever knew… She knew that there were risks coming back, but those risks were important, she thought, for the fight for democracy.”
Pakistan’s ambassador to the US, Mahmud Ali Durrani, Thursday insisted Musharraf’s government provided the former prime minister with unprecedented security.
He said that terrorists and extremists, who also have targeted Musharraf, were the only ones responsible for her death.