Bhutto death: How it happened

Vivid eyewitness accounts are continuing to circulate about exactly how Benazir Bhutto was killed as she left a campaign rally in Rawalpindi on Thursday.

One of the most direct has come from Getty picture agency photographer John Moore who had been covering the rally all day.

As he was preparing to leave, he told the London newspaper The Guardian, he was "shocked" to notice that Ms Bhutto was standing out of her car's sunroof waving to supporters as her vehicle slowly pushed its way through the crowds.

He continued: "As this happened, I was aware of Bhutto ducking back into the car and heard at least two gunshots. I picked up my camera unaware of exactly what was happening.

 

"I kept the motordrive running as I was pushed back in the crowd, getting pictures of the blast as it went off and crowd members reeling from it.

"The volume of people stopped me getting any closer."

Many of the pictures he took have since appeared in newspapers, television and news websites around the world - including this one.

'Kalashnikov'

A BBC correspondent at the rally, Shahzad Malik, said: "I heard a blast. I rushed across to where so many people were lying injured and dead."

Speaking from his hospital bed, an unnamed eyewitness gave this account: "Madame Benazir came outside the gate [after the rally]. After that there was commotion, there were shots and there was an explosion and then it was chaos."

Another eyewitness - also unnamed - was even closer: "We were standing right in front of her. In that instant a young man, fair, about 20 to 21 years of age, he fired a Kalashnikov aiming at BB [Bhutto].

"He was standing beside me, moved a little back, so I thrust my hand out at him and just then there was a blast.

Asked if it was the suicide bomber himself that he'd seen, he replied: "I can't really say. Was it him or someone else, I can't say."

A member of Ms Bhutto's PPP party, Mohammad Zaman, told the BBC: "The meeting went perfectly well. She delivered her speech, she came down the stage and got on the land-cruiser.

"She started coming out, we heard three [shots] fired, and after that the bomb blast went [off].

"And when I came down the road I saw there was loads and loads of injured. And I really thought that her vehicle was safe and left the place safely. I was hoping she would be okay."

In fact, she had been fatally injured.

 
PPP supporters have been accusing President Musharraf's government of failing to protect Ms Bhutto.

 But this has been vehemently denied by the acting Interior Minister, retired General Hamid Narwaz Khan.

 

'Dedicated security'

He told the BBC the government had had reports of threats to her life, and had passed them on.

 He continued: "She was protected, and we had provided a dedicated officer... to take care of her security.

 "Her rallies were also secured.

 "This rally in Liaqat Bagh ... the venue was totally secured through screen doors and a bullet-proof rostrum. All other security arrangements had been made with a very large deployment of police.

 "She came out after the rally and sat in her vehicle and the movement started.

 "Even at that time there were about 20 police escorting her, and the security officer assigned to her was travelling with her in the same vehicle."

 The minister went on to describe how the road was blocked by a group of her supporters, and Ms Bhutto stood up through the open sunroof of her car to greet them.

"That was the time she was hit by the suicide bomber," he said.

 "This was the best we could do," he added. "There were four other people travelling with her in the same vehicle ... if she had stayed down she would be safe, as all four of them are absolutely scratch-free.

 "But in the heat of the moment I think she got up just to wave at her supporters, and that is the time and the chance which the suicide bomber got to hit her."

1. Benazir Bhutto had addressed a rally of thousands of supporters in Rawalpindi's Liaqat Bagh Park
2. As her convoy was leaving the park via the rear gate onto Murree road, she was shot twice in the neck and chest
3. The gunman then blew himself up killing at least 16 people
4. Ms Bhutto was taken to Rawalpindi General Hospital, but was pronounced dead at 1816 local time.

 

 

 

 

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