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POLITICS: A Tribunal for Bhutto?

Analysis by Haider Rizvi

UNITED NATIONS, Jan 1 2008 (IPS) - When former Lebanese prime minister Rafik Hariri died in a bomb blast in February 2005, the United Nations Security Council immediately passed a resolution calling for the establishment of an international tribunal to investigate his murder.

The question arises if the world body would do the same to probe the assassination of popular Pakistani leader and former prime minister Benazir Bhutto? The possibility may not be ruled out. However, it depends on how the international players in the Security Council respond to the calls for an international inquiry.

On Dec. 27, within hours of Bhutto&#39s murder, the 15-member U.N. Security Council called an emergency meeting deploring her assassination and underlining the need to bring "perpetrators, organisers, financiers and sponsors" of the crime to justice.

But the fact that in its presidential statement, the Council described the fatal attack on Bhutto as "an act of terrorism" has raised many eyebrows, because it indirectly supports the Pakistan government, which in the eyes of Bhutto&#39s Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) is the prime suspect.

Critics say they are justified in asking the Council members how they knew that she was killed by "terrorists", and not the government she opposed. They also wonder why the Council hurried to adopt a presidential statement in the absence of any initial investigation.

The Council met at around 12 noon last Thursday, just a few hours after Bhutto&#39s death. According to U.N. officials, the decision to convene the Council meeting was made around 10:30 in the morning, some two hours after the attack.

A diplomatic source who was present at the meeting told IPS that the Council did not immediately agree because some members had disputed the wording of the presidential draft statement introduced by the United States.

Delegates from Belgium and Africa, according to the source, wanted to know why Bhutto&#39s murder should be described as a terrorist act in the absence of any conclusive evidence.

But the U.S .envoy insisted that the cause of her death was a terrorist act and that its ally Pakistan would like to retain that wording in the text. At that point the Belgian delegate reportedly asked: "Why should Pakistan tell us what to do? It&#39s not a member of the Council."

Soon after that the Council members reportedly decided to take a short break, a diplomatic practice that indicates difficulties in reaching consensus on issues of peace and security.

On their return, the members disagreed again and had another recess before reaching an agreement on the final draft with certain, but not really substantial, changes in the language.

The final statement still reflected more concern about "terrorism" than the assassination of Bhutto. In fact, the word "terrorism" appears 10 times more than the name of the slain Pakistani leader.

Critics also wonder why the Council did not call for an international investigation into her murder as it did in the case of the Lebanese leader Rafik Hariri, who was killed in more or less similar circumstances in February 2005.

In contrast to the Council&#39s statement, U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon&#39s remarks appear to be very carefully worded. Ban called Bhutto&#39s murder a "heinous crime", not an act committed by terrorists.

Since her murder at a public rally last Thursday, Bhutto&#39s supporters have consistently charged that the government led by President Pervez Musharraf was responsible for the assassination of their leader.

But Musharraf, who ruled Pakistan as a military dictator for about eight years and now as a civilian president, blames Islamist "terrorists" for Bhutto&#39s murder. So does U.S. President George W. Bush. So far, both Musharraf and Bush, who are allies in the so-called "war on terror", have failed to present any solid evidence to substantiate this claim.

Within hours after the assassination, the government in Islamabad said a Taliban leader, Baitullah Mehsud, with links to al Qaeda, was involved in Bhutto&#39s assassination – a charge Mehsud denies. The question is if the government knew that, why did it fail to stop the carnage?

Bhutto&#39s Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP), which mistrusts the Musharraf government, says it wants justice from the international community. Bhutto herself made a similar call for an international inquiry some two months ago when a powerful blast killed more than 100 of her supporters in Karachi.

In response, Musharraf not only refused to allow an international probe, but also rejected Bhutto&#39s demand for the removal of officials she suspected to be involved in the October attack on her rally. He blamed terrorists for the incident and promised to bring the culprits to justice while urging opposition leaders to stay away from holding mass rallies.

No one has been brought to book for the Karachi carnage.

Before her death, Bhutto charged that the October blast was masterminded by certain elements in the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), the military&#39s secret service notorious for its deep interference in the country&#39s politics.

According to experts on Afghanistan and Pakistan, the ISI was actively involved in setting up training camps for Islamist "holy warriors" who fought the Soviets in the 1980s. Many analysts believe close links still exist between the ISI and militant Islamist groups.

Pakistan, an artificial nation carved out of British India in 1947, has been ruled by military dictators for well over 30 years. Almost all of them enjoyed full backing from Washington. Bhutto&#39s father, Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, was the only Pakistani leader who openly clashed with the U.S. He was hanged by the U.S.-backed military dictator Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq in 1979.

Bhutto was around 25 at the time her father was executed. She spent five years in solitary confinement before her captors let her seek medical treatment in London in 1984. When she returned home in April 1986, millions of people took to the streets to show their support for her determination to challenge the army rule.

She won national elections in 1988 and became the first-ever woman prime minister, but could not complete her five-year term due to increased hostility from the army establishment. Bhutto regained power in 1993, but her term was cut short again by another president close to the army leadership. In both cases, she was thrown out of the office on corruption charges that were never proved.

After living in exile for about eight years, she reached an understanding with Musharraf that would have allowed her to run for prime minister and him to remain in office as president. But the U.S.-brokered deal did not work. During her election campaign, Bhutto not only posed a strong challenge to religious extremists, but also attacked Musharraf for cracking down on the judiciary, media and civil society.

The Musharraf regime has changed its version of events leading to Bhutto&#39s death. First it said the attack was carried out by a suicide bomber. But later the officials said she was killed when the force of the bomb blast knocked her head against the sun roof of her vehicle.

The state-owned television released new pictures last weekend showing Bhutto&#39s attackers – a gunman and a suicide bomber. The TV footage shows that Bhutto was inside her car, and no longer standing through the sun roof, when the explosion happened.

But the PPP has insisted she was killed by two bullets, one of which pierced her skull and another which hit her in the neck. No autopsy was conducted on Bhutto&#39s body, which was rushed to her ancestral village in an air force plane and a helicopter the same day she breathed her last.

When asked about the PPP demand for an international probe, U.N. officials refused to comment, but did not entirely rule out the possibility.

"We haven&#39t received any official request so far," Ban&#39s spokesman Farhan Haq told IPS. "We can&#39t say anything unless we have received such a request."