Taliban threat: SHC grants permission to strengthen Zardari's secuirty

Former president says his wife Benazir Bhutto was murdered and he fears the same for himself.

KARACHI: Former president and co-chairman of Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) Asif Ali Zardari was on Thursday granted permission to strengthen his already tight  personal security due to threats to his life.

A judge in Sindh High Court approved Zardari's application for 100 extra licences for his bodyguards to carry weapons, on top of the official security he is entitled to as former head of state.

"The judge has approved our request and ordered the federal and provincial governments to ensure security for the former president," Zardari’s aide Abu Bakar Zardari said

Abu Bakar had filed a petition to the court on Zardari’s behalf.

Zardari's wife and former prime minister Benazir Bhutto was assassinated in 2007 in an attack blamed on the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan and he fears the same for himself.

He is known to be very concerned about his personal safety and rarely moves about on the roads.

When he does venture out, he travels in an entourage of more than a dozen vehicles, escorted by police commandos and three vanloads of paramilitary Rangers.

His convoy also regularly includes an ambulance and a vehicle carrying signal jammers to stop anyone using a mobile phone to detonate a bomb near him.

In July, a suicide bomber killed Zardari's top personal security officer in an attack in Karachi.

While in June 2011, intelligence officials had arrested eight men believed to have been involved in a plot to assassinate him.

Zardari stepped down as the president on September 8. He presided over the only civilian government in Pakistan history to complete a full term in office and hand over to another through the ballot box.