Post date: Feb 12, 2011 1:20:13 PM
A Pakistani court issues arrest warrant for exiled former president Pervez Musharraf in connection with the 2007 assassination of Benazir Bhutto, officially implicating him for first time in the death
of the former prime minister and rival. Musharraf spokesman says charges "frivolous".
ISLAMABAD, PAKISTAN (FILE-2007) REUTERS - A Pakistani anti-terrorism court has issued an arrest warrant for exiled former president Pervez Musharraf in connection with the 2007 assassination of Benazir Bhutto, a spokesman for Musharraf said on Saturday (February 12).
The former Pakistani prime minister was killed in a gun and suicide bomb attack after an election rally in the city of Rawalpindi on December 27, 2007, weeks after she returned to Pakistan following years in self-imposed exile.Musharraf's spokesman Mohammad Ali Saif told Reuters Television in an interview the allegations against Musharraf were
baseless.
"There is a frivolous allegation, a baseless allegation, an allegation without any meat, without any substance that he was involved in the assassination of Benazir Bhutto, that he was responsible for the assassination of Benazir Bhutto. And this allegation and this accusation is based on simply surmises and conjectures -- and on statements that appeared time and again in different media channels by his political opponents -- to the effect that he did not provide adequate security to Benazir Bhutto and that he was aware of a conspiracy against her that she would be assassinated or an assassination attempt would be made against her," Saif said.
Bhutto's assassination was one of the most shocking events in Pakistan's turbulent history and remains shrouded in mystery.
Saif said it was not Musharraf's duty to provide security to Bhutto.
"Being the president of Pakistan, it was not his duty to provide security to political personalities, it was the duty of police department. And police department did provide, in my opinion, adequate security. At the time of her assassination there were approximately 1500 police officials deputed to guard her. The very fact that she lost her life was, I believe, in technical terms, her own mistake. She decided to come out of the protective cover of the vehicle which was a bomb-proof vehicle, which was a blast-proof, which was a bullet-proof vehicle. When she saw people chanting slogans, she decided to come out and wave her hands and greet them. And that is when the explosion took place," he said.
During an in-camera hearing of the Benazir Bhutto assassination case before a judge of a special anti-terrorism court inside the high security Adiala Jail, the prosecutor pleaded for a non-bailable arrest warrant against Musharraf, court sources said.
The court, admitting the plea, issued the bailable arrest warrant for the former President and ordered him to appear in court on the 19th of February, the sources said.
"I believe that while taking this action, the court frankly did not take into consideration the inherent weaknesses and the express flaws and lacunas that were in existence in the challan (charge sheet) and the investigation report. They frankly refused to take cognizance of those and decided in their sweet will to issue arrest warrants. I believe there were other measures available in the law of the land like summoning him or sending him a notice. But instead of doing that the court decided to resort to the extreme measure of issuing warrants of arrest," Saif said.
Musharraf, who become embroiled in a row with the judiciary and briefly imposed a state of emergency in 2007, has said he realised his popularity had plummeted because of some wrong decisions he had made in the last year of his presidency.
Saif said Musharraf was ready to cooperate with the courts if approached.
"If at all they approach us, and they approach President Musharraf for recording his version, we will definitely co-operate because that is what they should do under the law and that is what we intend to do to co-operate and to definitely provide them with our version of whatever we feel about, or whatever we think about this case. We are waiting for them to contact us; they haven't done so far," he said.
A report by a U.N. commission of inquiry released last year said any credible investigation into Bhutto's killing should not rule out the possibility that members of Pakistan's military and security establishment were involved.
It heavily criticised Pakistani authorities, saying they had "severely hampered" the investigation.
Musharraf, himself the target of at least two bomb attacks, has repeatedly dismissed suggestions he, the security agencies
or military were involved in killing his old rival.
Musharraf, a former military chief who came to power in a bloodless coup in 1999, has lived in self-imposed exile since he
stepped down under threat of impeachment in 2008. He spends most of his time in London and Dubai.
Since Musharraf has limited support, the arrest warrant may not stir up politics in Pakistan, an unstable U.S. ally whose
government is led by the Pakistan People's Party of the late Bhutto.
Her husband, Asif Ali Zardari, is now president and is struggling to cope with the multiple challenges, including a stubborn Taliban insurgency and a stagnant economy.