Musharraf Delivers a Fierce Denial
Pakistan's President Blames Assassinated Rival for Being Incautious

By Griff Witte
Washington Post Foreign Service
Friday, January 4, 2008; A14

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan, Jan. 3 -- Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf on Thursday vehemently denied that he or his government played any role in the death of former prime minister Benazir Bhutto, and instead blamed her for not heeding warnings to take extra precautions.

A week after Bhutto's assassination, Musharraf bristled at the suggestion -- often made by Bhutto supporters -- that he or his allies had had a hand in her death, saying the government lacked both the means and the motive.

"I have been brought up in a very educated and civilized family which believes in values, which believes in principles, which believes in character," he said at a news conference for foreign journalists held at the president's house. "My family is not a family which believes in killing people."

Musharraf added that he did not think the nation's powerful intelligence services were capable of recruiting someone to carry out a suicide bombing against Bhutto.

Instead, he again pinned responsibility on Islamic extremists, citing Baitullah Mehsud and Maulana Fazlullah, two pro-Taliban commanders who have created armies of radical followers in the country's restive northwest.

Bhutto's followers have focused their suspicions on several people with either past or present ties to Musharraf, four of whom Bhutto had named in a letter to the president as enemies plotting to kill her. One of those she implicated was Chaudhry Pervez Elahi, a former chief minister of Punjab province and a likely candidate for prime minister if Musharraf's allies do well enough in next month's elections to form a government.

But Musharraf said that the allegation that Elahi, or anyone else from the government, had participated in the attack was "baseless," and that Scotland Yard investigators he had invited to probe the matter would not be pursuing that possibility.

"I would like to know how she died, ultimately," Musharraf said. "But I will not like anyone to go on a wild-goose chase and start creating a disturbance."

Sherry Rehman, spokeswoman for Bhutto's Pakistan People's Party, accused Musharraf of trying to set the terms of Scotland Yard's investigation before it had even begun. "It's not for him to decide what's a wild-goose chase," she said.

Appearing jovial and confident while admitting that his country is in "crisis," Musharraf said he decided to invite British investigators because he was not satisfied with the work of Pakistan's own security services. He pointed to their decision to wash down the site minutes after the attack occurred and before forensic evidence could be collected. But he called that choice an example of "inefficiency" rather than an indication of anything nefarious.

"They didn't do it with the intention of hiding secrets," he said.

Since Bhutto's death, the nation has been deep in turmoil. She was killed while leaving a rally in the garrison city of Rawalpindi, and the news sparked three days of riots. The resulting damage led the election commission on Wednesday to delay by six weeks a long-awaited vote that had been slated for Tuesday. Pakistanis will now go to the polls to elect a new Parliament on Feb. 18.

Throughout last year, Bhutto and Musharraf had been negotiating a U.S.-brokered power-sharing arrangement that might have involved him serving as president and her as prime minister.

The two never trusted each other, however, and that mistrust lives on between Musharraf and Bhutto's husband, Asif Ali Zardari. In the past week, he has accused Musharraf of criminal negligence and called the president's party "the killer league."

Bhutto had been waving to a crowd of supporters from the back seat of her bulletproof sport-utility vehicle when she was fired on at close range by one assailant, moments before another blew himself up.

Musharraf on Thursday suggested Bhutto had left herself vulnerable and had failed to take necessary safeguards despite warnings from government officials in Pakistan and abroad that she was under threat. Musharraf said she had specifically been told not to go to Liaqat Bagh, the park where the assassination took place.

"She went of her own volition, ignoring the threat," he said. And once there, he said, she decided to take the risk of poking her upper torso out of the sunroof so she could wave goodbye. Her two companions in the back seat of the SUV, Musharraf said, were uninjured in the attack because they had stayed inside.

"Who is to blame for her coming out of the vehicle and standing outside? Who is to blame? The law enforcement agencies?" Musharraf asked indignantly.

Bhutto's aides have said that she knew the risk she was taking by waving to supporters but could not resist responding to their cheers with a display of thanks. Bhutto had a knack throughout her career for drawing massive crowds, and public rallies were an essential part of the PPP's campaign strategy.

Rehman, the PPP spokeswoman, called Musharraf's comments on Thursday "ludicrous" and accused the president of ignoring Bhutto's frequent requests for better protection. "They were the ones who were failing to take her security seriously," she said. Bhutto had asked for four police vehicles to escort her car, Rehman said, but on the day of the attack there had been just one. "That day, I hardly saw any police," she said.

Musharraf acknowledged Thursday that he is also under threat, saying his own security detail is often unhappy with him because they believe he takes too many risks.

"I cannot say that I am very, very secure. There are people gunning for me," Musharraf said. "But I know how to protect myself."