Brits say al Qaeda behind Bhutto murder

Sunday Times:

BRITISH officials have revealed that evidence amassed by Scotland Yard detectives points towards Al-Qaeda militants being responsible for the assassination of Benazir Bhutto.

Five experts in video evidence and forensic science have been in Pakistan for 10 days since President Pervez Musharraf took up an offer from Gordon Brown for British help in the investigation of the December 27 killing. Last week they were joined by three specialists in explosives.

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Musharraf was quick to blame the killing on Baitullah Mehsud, a tribal leader from the Afghan border area of southern Waziristan with links to Al-Qaeda. The interior ministry released a transcript of a purported telephone conversation between Mehsud and a militant cleric in which, though Bhutto’s name was not mentioned, he appeared to congratulate him on the death, saying: “Fantastic job. Very brave boys, the ones who killed her.”

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... British and American officials, who have examined the transcript, say they believe it is genuine and share Musharraf’s view that Mehsud is behind most of the suicide bombings in Pakistan.

Asked why Pakistani forces do not capture Mehsud, one official said: “It’s not so easy to go into tribal areas. Look what happened to the last lot of Pakistani soldiers that tried.” According to diplomats, Mehsud had dispatched teams of suicide bombers round the country to follow Bhutto to rallies and seize an opportunity to kill her.

The gun fired at Bhutto has been checked for fingerprints by the Scotland Yard detectives. A government minister told The Sunday Times that these have been traced through identity cards to a man in Swat, an area where Mehsud’s men have been fighting.

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It is not clear that even a competent inquiry by Scotland yard can overcome the suspicion raised by the bungling of reports on the shooting, but I think they have found the essential facts and the essential villain. Al Qaeda needs to the the target of all sides and Pakistan needs to take whatever help it can get in running al Qaeda to ground. Tolerating a foreign force like al Qaeda which is supporting an insurgency like Taliban is a huge mistake and Paksitan needs to accept the help of the US in riding itself and the world of this infestation.