[NYTr] Cui Bono in Pakistan - Who Killed Bhutto?

[All the News That Doesn't Fit]

CounterPunch - Dec 31, 2007
http://www.counterpunch.org/fisk12312007.html

Cui Bono in Pakistan

Who Killed Bhutto?

By ROBERT FISK

Weird, isn't it, how swiftly the narrative is laid down for us. Benazir
Bhutto, the courageous leader of the Pakistan People's Party, is
assassinated in Rawalpindi--attached to the very capital of Islamabad
wherein ex-General Pervez Musharraf lives--and we are told by George
Bush that her murderers were "extremists" and "terrorists". Well, you
can't dispute that.

But the implication of the Bush comment was that Islamists were behind
the assassination. It was the Taliban madmen again, the al-Qa'ida
spider who struck at this lone and brave woman who had dared to call
for democracy in her country.

Of course, given the childish coverage of this appalling tragedy--and
however corrupt Ms Bhutto may have been, let us be under no illusions
that this brave lady is indeed a true martyr--it's not surprising that
the "good-versus-evil" donkey can be trotted out to explain the carnage
in Rawalpindi.

Who would have imagined, watching the BBC or CNN on Thursday, that her
two brothers, Murtaza and Shahnawaz, hijacked a Pakistani airliner in
1981 and flew it to Kabul where Murtaza demanded the release of
political prisoners in Pakistan. Here, a military officer on the plane
was murdered. There were Americans aboard the flight--which is probably
why the prisoners were indeed released.

Only a few days ago--in one of the most remarkable (but typically
unrecognised) scoops of the year--Tariq Ali published a brilliant
dissection of Pakistan (and Bhutto) corruption in the London Review of
Books, focusing on Benazir and headlined: "Daughter of the West". In
fact, the article was on my desk to photocopy as its subject was being
murdered in Rawalpindi.

Towards the end of this report, Tariq Ali dwelt at length on the
subsequent murder of Murtaza Bhutto by police close to his home at a
time when Benazir was prime minister--and at a time when Benazir was
enraged at Murtaza for demanding a return to PPP values and for
condemning Benazir's appointment of her own husband as minister for
industry, a highly lucrative post.

In a passage which may yet be applied to the aftermath of Benazir's
murder, the report continues: "The fatal bullet had been fired at close
range. The trap had been carefully laid, but, as is the way in
Pakistan, the crudeness of the operation--false entries in police
log-books, lost evidence, witnesses arrested and intimidated--a
policeman killed who they feared might talk--made it obvious that the
decision to execute the prime minister's brother had been taken at a
very high level."

When Murtaza's 14-year-old daughter, Fatima, rang her aunt Benazir to
ask why witnesses were being arrested--rather than her father's
killers--she says Benazir told her: "Look, you're very young. You don't
understand things." Or so Tariq Ali's exposi would have us believe.
Over all this, however, looms the shocking power of Pakistan's ISI, the
Inter Services Intelligence.

This vast institution--corrupt, venal and brutal--works for Musharraf.

But it also worked--and still works--for the Taliban. It also works for
the Americans. In fact, it works for everybody. But it is the key which
Musharraf can use to open talks with America's enemies when he feels
threatened or wants to put pressure on Afghanistan or wants to appease
the " extremists" and "terrorists" who so oppress George Bush. And let
us remember, by the way, that Daniel Pearl, the Wall Street Journal
reporter beheaded by his Islamist captors in Karachi, actually made his
fatal appointment with his future murderers from an ISI commander's
office. Ahmed Rashid's book Taliban provides riveting proof of the
ISI's web of corruption and violence. Read it, and all of the above
makes more sense.

But back to the official narrative. George Bush announced on Thursday
he was "looking forward" to talking to his old friend Musharraf. Of
course, they would talk about Benazir. They certainly would not talk
about the fact that Musharraf continues to protect his old
acquaintance--a certain Mr Khan--who supplied all Pakistan's nuclear
secrets to Libya and Iran. No, let's not bring that bit of the "axis of
evil" into this.

So, of course, we were asked to concentrate once more on all those "
extremists" and "terrorists", not on the logic of questioning which many
Pakistanis were feeling their way through in the aftermath of Benazir's
assassination.

It doesn't, after all, take much to comprehend that the hated elections
looming over Musharraf would probably be postponed indefinitely if his
principal political opponent happened to be liquidated before polling
day.

So let's run through this logic in the way that Inspector Ian Blair
might have done in his policeman's notebook before he became the top
cop in London.

Question: Who forced Benazir Bhutto to stay in London and tried to
prevent her return to Pakistan? Answer: General Musharraf.

Question: Who ordered the arrest of thousands of Benazir's supporters
this month? Answer: General Musharraf.

Question: Who placed Benazir under temporary house arrest this month?
Answer: General Musharraf.

Question: Who declared martial law this month? Answer General Musharraf.

Question: who killed Benazir Bhutto?

Er. Yes. Well quite.

You see the problem? Yesterday, our television warriors informed us the
PPP members shouting that Musharraf was a "murderer" were complaining
he had not provided sufficient security for Benazir. Wrong. They were
shouting this because they believe he killed her.

[Robert Fisk is a reporter for The Independent and author of Pity the
Nation. He is also a contributor to CounterPunch's collection, The
Politics of Anti-Semitism. Fisk's new book is The Conquest of the
Middle East.]