Three years on, mystery still unsolved

PPP activists are saddened by the fact that the real masterminds behind the attack remain at large.

KARACHI: As caravans of PPP supporters struck out towards Garhi Khuda Bakhsh, the burial site of Benazir Bhutto, on Sunday, one slogan stood out: BB ham sharminda hain, teray qatil zinda hein (BB we are ashamed, your murderers are still alive.)

Three years after the assassination of Benazir Bhutto, party activists are saddened by the fact that the real masterminds behind the attack remain at large.

“When authorities can’t even solve the murder of Khalid Shahenshah, we can’t really expect much progress in the probe into Benazir’s assassination,” said one furious jiyala.

Shahenshah, the slain PPP chairperson’s chief security guard, was a key eyewitnesses of the December 27, 2007 attack in Rawalpindi. He was in Benazir’s vehicle along with Senator Safdar Abbasi. He was killed under mysterious circumstances in a drive-by shooting in Karachi in July, 2008.

DIG Iqbal Mehmood admitted that Shahenshah’s case remains unsolved. “No arrests have been  made in the case to-date,” he said, adding, that all talk about suspected underworld or terrorist link into this attack were no more than mere hearsay as no such links could be found.

Even the probe into the assassination attempt on Benazir on the Karsaz Road on Oct 18, 2007, in which 179 people were killed, has gone nowhere. SSP Investigations Niaz Khosa said the four terrorists were, in fact, low-level Taliban operatives who had been languishing in Karachi jail. They were interrogated in connection with the Karsaz killings and were handed over to the police by secret ‘agencies’. However, they could not be linked with the twin suicide bombings.

“These four (men) were then sent back to the jail,” Khosa said, adding that a total of 16 people were picked up in the case, all of whom have been released over the years, since their involvement could not be established.

PPP Information Secretary Fauzia Wahab said it would be unfair to say that no headway had been made into Benazir’s assassination. “The second Joint Investigation Team (JIT) headed by Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) is doing its best. They have taken into its custody former CPO Rawalpindi Saud Aziz and SP Khurram Shahzad, who only recently have started to spill the beans,” Wahab told The Express Tribune. Aziz is reported to have told investigators that he was acting on the instructions of four ISI and MI officials and it was on their orders that the police hosed down the crime scene.

But even if the PPP has the will, does it have the capacity to expose and interrogate the people behind Aziz? When asked, a senior federal level PPP official lost her cool and said: “Do you want the PPP government to be removed? We are doing what we can.”

DG FIA Waseem Ahmed claimed that there was no pressure on him or his organisation. But when asked if he would be knocking on the doors of the intelligence agencies and some current and former military officials allegedly blamed by Aziz and some named in the UN commission’s report, he admitted: “Until and unless there is any concrete evidence against them, we can’t arrest or interrogate them.”

The first JIT, which was formed and disbanded before the UN commission arrived, had arrested five persons: Aitezaz Shah, Sher Zaman, Husnain Gul, Mohammad Rafaqat and Rasheed Ahmed. In addition, the team charged Baitullah Mehsud, Nasrullah, Abdullah and a ‘Maulvi Sahab’ as ‘proclaimed offenders’. However, Mehsud was killed in a drone attack in August 2009 and Nasrullah reportedly died in an attack in Fata. Their deaths, says terrorism expert Amir Rana, has only complicated the matter since it would be even more difficult to prove whether these extremists acted on their own or were given the task by some powerful individuals to carry out the strike.

Benazir in her letter to Musharraf had named former DG ISI Hamid Gul, former DG IB Ejaz Shah and PML-Q leader Pervaiz Ilahi as masterminds of her planned assassination. The FIA is yet to question the three.

Also, according to the UN report into Benazir Bhutto’s murder, the commission was told that Aziz “was ordered to hose down the (crime) scene by Major General Nadeem Ijaz Ahmad, then Director General of MI.” Ahmad continues to serve as a military commander in Gujranwala.

Other intelligence officials named in the UN report include the then ISI deputy director general Major General Nusrat Naeem, who got in touch with Prof Muhammad Mussadiq Khan, the surgeon who operated on Benazir Bhutto at the Rawalpindi General Hospital. The report said Naeem had initially denied making any calls to the hospital, but later admitted to the commission that he spoke with Mussadiq through ISI official, Colonel Jehangir Akhtar’s mobile phone, who was present at the hospital.

Also, the then director general ISI Major General Nadeem Taj met Bhutto “in the early hours of December 27 at Zardari House.” The UN report said “direct knowledgeable sources told the commission that they spoke about the elections and about threats to Ms Bhutto’s life; versions differ as to how much detail was conveyed about the threats.” However, the report added that the commission was satisfied “that at the least Maj Gen Taj told Ms Bhutto that the ISI was concerned about a possible terrorist attack.” Taj is currently Adjutant General, GHQ.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 27^th, 2010.