Bhutto 'killed' in suicide blast

[skylee]

Awful news ...

Bhutto 'killed' in suicide blast

2007-12-27 HKT 21:49

Reports from Pakistan say the former prime minister and opposition leader, Benazir Bhutto, has been killed in a suicide bomb attack at an election rally in the city of Rawalpindi. Other reports said she'd only been injured and taken to hospital. Ms Bhutto had just addressed the rally when it was hit by the blast. About 20 other people are reported to have been killed in the attack. Ms Bhutto has twice been the country's prime minister and was campaigning ahead of elections due in January. In October some 130 people were killed in an attack on Ms Bhutto's cavalcade when she returned to the country.

[liuzhou]

Now confirmed.

[gato]

An "obit" from the NY Times. It's very negative, kind of curious considering the occasion.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/28/world/asia/28pakistan.html?hp

Bhutto Killed in Attack on Political Rally

[skylee]

And from BBC.

[rezaf]

I feel sorry for her, though she singed her own death when she returned to Pakistan. I don't know what she was thinking about by bringing democracy to a country known for the world’s wildest fundamentalists.

[atitarev]

I agree with your comment and I am also very sad about her death. Well, there are still people who risk their lives to bring democracy and normality to Pakistan. In one of her comments recently she said something about Pakistani people being peaceful, open-minded, etc. Was she wrong? I don't know. People who supported her are in majority but how much does it take to assassinate a person?

...

Here's another of her comments after the previous attempt to murder her:

"Nothing doing. We must go on," she said. "If we turn back now those trying to scare us will ingrain permanent fear in the locality especially for the aggrieved family of the victim. We must break the siege of fear and send the message to the gangsters that no amount of gunfire can deter us."

[rezaf]

In one of her comments recently she said something about Pakistani people being peaceful, open-minded, etc. Was she wrong? I don't know.

I am Iranian and when I lived in Dubai I saw all kinds of Muslims. In my opinion moderate Pakistanis are even more religious than fundimentalist Iranian Muslims. Pakistanis are very religious which brings many of them to extremism and then to terrorism. Extremist Islamic ideas can also be found in countries like Saudi Arabia, but what makes Pakistan especial is that while in other countries extremism is mostly in theory, they bring it into action.

[nipponman]

I notice everyone is quick to blame alq and OBL but Bhutto herself said that if she was killed it was probably Musharaf. Anyway, this is tragic we need to move past assassinations in modern politics...

[bhchao]

Pakistan seems like the faultline where extremism and moderation converge.

Ironically US foreign policy bolsters authoritarian governments when the need arises, like fighting terrorism. Not much different from American support for KMT regime in Taiwan during the Cold War.

[82riceballs]

I just saw it on this morning and yesterday morning's CNN news report... about 150 supporters were killed during the two suicide bombers yesterday.

[rezaf]

America's need has not always been fighting terrorists, not long ago it used to be making terrorists. America's needs are everywhere. There is a theory about Iran: Half a century ago communism (<-some sort of) was growing very fast in Iran. America was afraid of the Soviet Union reaching the Persian Gulf, so they changed the direction of the possible revolution from the communists to the Islamists and in another incident (this one is for sure) when democracy in the hands of a good secular government (Dr.Mosadegh) was naturally growing in Iran, CIA destroyed that government. Today's enemies of America are all somehow creations of America itself. It is the art of war and the lives of the middle Easters are going to be played in this game until they have oil.

[Outofin]

In my opinion moderate Pakistanis are even more religious than fundimentalist Iranian Muslims.

This reminds me how some say about the US. "Liberal" is only a relative term. Even Demcorat candidates are all very conservative by european standard.

[HashiriKata]

America's need has not always been fighting terrorists, not long ago it used to be making terrorists.

Can you please elaborate (or substantiate):

1. What kinds of terrorists is America fighting against? (From your post, it sounds like America is fighting against itself)

2. Since when has it stopped "making terrorists"?

Thanks!

[Lu]

Was shocked and so sad when I saw that news. It looked so hopeful, elections coming up, banished democrats returning and deciding not to boycott them, and now this.

[gougou]

I was very shocked by her death as well, particularly because I heard of it while I was reading Rushdie's "Shalimar the Clown", which deals with the Kashmir conflict and mentions Bhutto's father two or three times. It seems a big step back for peace in that region.

[rezaf]

Like when they needed Islamists to fight against communism in Afghanistan or when they needed Saddam to fight Iran. I didn't say that they have stopped making terrorists. They are just an instrument, sometimes you need them and sometimes you don't. It's a complicated war. On one side we have America, Britain, Europe, big companies (even China and Russia) and what goes between them, on the other side we have the people of the Middle East who are happened to be on a lot of oil. Anyway it's now about Pakistan, tomorrow it will be some other country in the Middle East on the news.

[bhchao]

CIA helped Saddam rise to power.

[shibole]

This reminds me how some say about the US. "Liberal" is only a relative term. Even Demcorat candidates are all very conservative by european standard.

Actually, Liberal in the US is really a dishonest term. In the US it really means "Socialist" whereas classical liberals are more like what are called Libertarians. I thought I had read somewhere that in Europe and many other places the term "liberal" usually referred to classical liberalism and socialists were just called socialists.

But yes, the socialists in the US are on average less socialist than the ones in Europe.

[gato]

Some food for thought.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/04/opinion/04dalrymple.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

Bhutto’s Deadly Legacy

By WILLIAM DALRYMPLE

Published: January 4, 2008

It was under Ms. Bhutto’s watch that the Pakistani intelligence agency, Inter-Services Intelligence, first installed the Taliban in Afghanistan. It was also at that time that hundreds of young Islamic militants were recruited from the madrassas to do the agency’s dirty work in Indian Kashmir. It seems that, like some terrorist equivalent of Frankenstein’s monster, the extremists turned on both the person and the state that had helped bring them into being.

I asked Benazir Bhutto about her Kashmir policy and the potential dangers of the growing role of religious extremists in the conflict during an interview in 1994. “India tries to gloss over its policy of repression in Kashmir,” she replied. “India does have might, but has been unable to crush the people of Kashmir. We are not prepared to keep silent, and collude with repression.”

Hamid Gul, who was the head of the intelligence agency during her first administration, was more forthcoming still. “The Kashmiri people have risen up,” he told me, “and it is the national purpose of Pakistan to help liberate them.” He continued, “If the jihadis go out and contain India, tying down their army on their own soil, for a legitimate cause, why should we not support them?”

Benazir Bhutto’s death is, of course, a calamity, particularly as she embodied the hopes of so many liberal Pakistanis. But, contrary to the commentary we’ve seen in the last week, she was not comparable to Myanmar’s Daw Aung San Suu Kyi. Ms. Bhutto’s governments were widely criticized by Amnesty International and other groups for their use of death squads and terrible record on deaths in police custody, abductions and torture. As for her democratic bona fides, she had no qualms about banning rallies by opposing political parties while in power.

Within her own party, she declared herself the president for life and controlled all decisions. She rejected her brother Murtaza’s bid to challenge her for its leadership and when he persisted, he was shot dead in highly suspicious circumstances during a police ambush outside the Bhutto family home.

[atitarev]

President Musharraf mentioned 3 things that Ms. Bhutto missed to become successful in Pakistan:

1. Good relationships with the military.

2. Good relationships with the religious lobby.

3. Not being considered America's extension.

Source: Newsweek.

I don't like him but I have to agree. In Pakistani mind being anti-religious and pro-American are not so positive. The US has itself to blame for feeding Pakistan with money and weapons for a long period.