Outside Islamabad

I. ARRESTS IN THE US
Investigators outside Islamabad follow Faisal Shahzad’s money trail leading to arrests in Long Island, New Jersey and Boston.

NYT: FBI Arrests 3 Linked to Times Square Bomb Case
The Times reports early morning FBI raids in half a dozen locations in the Northeast, as part of the investigation into the failed Times Square car bombing. Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. says the three Pakistani men taken into custody may have provided money to the man who has admitted carrying out the unsuccessful attack.

BBC.com: FBI arrests three over New York bomb inquiry
Homes in New York, New Jersey and Massachusetts were searched early on Thursday. Justice department spokesman Dean Boyd said the men were being held over alleged immigration violations and that the searches were the result of evidence collected during a 13-day investigation. Mr Shazhad has told officials he acted alone. But investigators have uncovered a possible link over the attempted bombing to the Pakistani Taliban and a Kashmiri Islamist group. “The Pakistani Taliban claimed responsibility for the failed attempt in Times Square. If this claim is true, the attempt would be the group’s first act in the United States.”

WATCH: CNN, Cash couriers target of Northeast raids, source says

III. A PAKISTANI ACCOMPLICE?
The Washington Post, Pakistan arrests man with militant ties who says he aided Times Square bomb suspect
The Pakistani government has arrested a suspect with connections to a Pakistani militant group who said he acted as an accomplice to the man accused of trying to bomb Times Square, U.S. officials said

III. OBAMA BACKS PAKISTAN

Pakistan more willing to act against terrorism: Obama
US president says his government’s goal is to break down old suspicions, bad habits and continue to work with Pakistani government

IV. BACK PAGES

Dawn: Details of evidence in Benazir Bhutto’s case submitted
Police officials accused of destroying vital pieces of evidence after Ms Benazir Bhutto’s assassination have submitted to investigators details of about 30 items from the crime scene.

Dawn: Father calls Saif-ur-Rehman’s arrest in Chile a trap
Although reports from Chile suggested that Rehman went to the US embassy for visa processing, his father Mehmood Ahmad Rehman Khan claimed he already had a five-year valid visa for the US, adding that his son had been called to the US embassy for some questioning.

Dawn, Tell-tale silence in Faridkot
FARIDKOT: The comment itself was quite innocuous. The voice tone was balanced and the expression clear and un-halting. And yet there was something conspiratorial about it.

The Daily Times: Fate of 46 ‘fake degree holders’ hangs in balance
While the graduation requirement for candidates looking to contest elections to parliament was withdrawn in 2008, fake degree cases – pending with the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) – continue to haunt dozens of public representatives.

The Daily Times: Baroness Warsi named Britain’s first female Muslim minister
Sayeeda Warsi has been announced as the Conservative Party’s chairwoman, becoming the first Muslim woman to be a part of the British cabinet, a private TV channel reported on Wednesday.

NYT: Psychologist Says Strip-Searches Traumatized Embassy-Bombings Suspect
A former detainee at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, who faces terrorism charges in Manhattan suffers from post-traumatic-stress disorder which is triggered by strip-searches he must undergo whenever he is taken between jail and court, a psychologist hired by his lawyers says.

V. THE OTHER SIDE

Dawn: Pakistani psychologists issue conflict health warning
In the conflict between Taliban insurgents and Pakistan’s army, thousands have been killed in bombings of everything from military and police facilities to crowded street markets; even a volleyball match was attacked. Countless others have been wounded. But the psychological toll often goes unnoticed, even though underfunded and understaffed hospitals are treating a sharply rising number of people who can’t cope with bloodshed.

Dawn, OP-ED: Let’s discuss culture-I.A. Rehman

The call to ban all controversial plays is the most ridiculous idea one expects to hear from any quarter. Most purposeful theatre, if not all of it, is controversial because it challenges social norms and practices. Shunning controversy means suppression of dissent and perpetuation of the status quo with all its decadence. Those who cannot make controversy palatable to their audience harm only themselves.

WATCH: Washingtonpost.com, On leadership

I. IS HE OR ISN’T HE?
Editorials and opinions inside and outside Islamabad feel out Faisal Shahzad’s Taliban connection.

Washingtonpost.com, Holder & Company jump the gun on Shahzad
The Post’s blogger questions how US Attorney General Holder can be so certain that Shahzad is a virtual agent of the Pakistani Taliban so early in the investigation.

The Guardian, Pakistan denies Taliban link to Times Square bomb suspect
Pakistani investigators dismiss US claims that Faisal Shahzad was working under direction of Pakistani Taliban

The Daily Times, Editorial, Change of Tone
The US is now beginning to perceive Pakistan’s policy for what it has been for the past nine years: a double-edged sword, slaying a dragon that only sprouts more heads

WATCH: 60 Minutes, Homegrown Terror

WATCH: 60 Minutes, Hillary Clinton on the Pakistan Connection

WATCH: Express 24/7 Pakistani Americans Reax

II. TERROR DENIAL

Dawn, Editorial, Jihadi infrastructure
The recovery of jihadi paraphernalia from a Karachi mosque is a sobering reminder that militant outfits are quietly carrying on their business in Pakistan.

Dawn, Editorial, Ulema and terrorism
Some ulema suggest the government’s ‘pro-America’ foreign policy justifies the militants’ war against it.

The Daily Times, The terrorist question —Dr Manzur Ejaz
No other Muslim country sponsors private religious and sectarian militias for domestic use or to achieve strategic goals. Probably, every state, other than Pakistan, knows fully well that the rise of private militias is bound to threaten the state’s monopoly of using power and coercion

III. KARZAI IN WASHINGTON

The Washington Post, A fence-mending agenda for President Obama and Afghanistan’s Hamid Karzai-Zalmay Khalilzad
Among other things, the former US Ambassador to Afghanistan stresses that success in Afghanistan depends heavily on regional relations. He writes, “Just as we are unclear on Karzai’s approach to the Taliban, Karzai is confused about our relations with regional actors such as Pakistan. These points must be clarified during his visit…”

NYT: At U.S.-Afghan Meetings, Talk of Nuts and Bolts
On Wednesday, as a delegation of eight Afghan ministers took seats across a polished oval table from President Obama in the Cabinet Room, the leadoff speaking role went to Muhammad Asif Rahimi, an articulate, burly fellow with salt-and-pepper hair.

IV. BACK PAGES

NYT, Chile: Pakistani Still in Custody
A Santiago court extended the detention of a Pakistani man arrested Monday after traces of explosive material were found on his belongings as he entered the American Embassy there.
The Daily Times, VIEW: Taliban vis-à-vis the state of Pakistan —Daud Khattak
Such is the level of fear among the common people that not a single person from the village, not even the family members of the three abducted whose hands were severed, dared to inform the political administration or any other available state or government agency

The Express Tribune, 200,000 Facebook fans want me back: Musharraf
Former president Pervez Musharraf has said that he has 200,000 fans on the social networking site Facebook, and they want him to return to Pakistan.

Pakistan’s elite yet to pay their taxes
Punjab Excise and Taxation Department issued notices to multiple luxury car owners including former president Farooq Leghari, Abida Hussain, Zulfiqar Khosa, Makhdoom Ahmed Mahmood, Hina Rabbani Khar, Wasim Akram and Inzamamul Haq, who owe Rs 600 million in taxes.

V. THE OTHER SIDE

Slackistan to debut at Cannes
The trailer for the film debuted late last year and was talked about obsessively amongst what the film’s target audience will be – the bored 20-somethings whose days revolve around idly watching the news and figuring out where their lives are headed. 10 minutes of the film are being shown at the Cannes Film Festival.

The Daily Times, VIEW: Raising the curtain on the burqa —Reem Wasay
To impose restrictions and demarcations on the liberal arts is to indirectly avert any attempts at conveying dissent and opposition to the prevailing status quo by the masses, marring the very foundations upon which this nation, any nation for that matter, was created

I. THE PAKISTANI CONNECTION
News and opinion inside and outside Islamabad debate Faisal Shahzad’s link to Pakistani Taliban

NYT, Pakistani Taliban Behind Times Sq. Plot, Holder Says
The accusation by U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder should increase pressure on the Pakistan military to attack the Taliban in the lawless region of North Waziristan.

Dawn, OP-ED, Faisal Shahzad’s anti-Americanism–Pervez Hoodbhoy
The man who tried to set off a car bomb in Times Square was a Pakistani. Why is this unsurprising? Because when you hold a burning match to a gasoline tank, the laws of chemistry demand combustion.

Dawn OP-ED, Pakistan – A nursery of modern jihad?
Osama bin Laden’s ideology of global jihad against the United States and its allies, rooted in the mountains of the Afghan-Pakistani border, has inspired myriad offshoot groups and galvanised alienated youth.

Dawn OP-ED, Path of Terrorism leads but to Pakistan–Cowasjee
The adoption of terrorism tactics can no longer be merely attributed to ignorance, poverty, deprivation or hardship.
Many of our neo-terrorists are schooled and brainwashed beings, with a grudge, or several grudges, imbued with bravado, intent on disrupting what is left of civilised life, with nary a care as to how many complete strangers they either blow to smithereens or maim, or how much they destroy.

The Daily Times, ANALYSIS: Youth and militancy —Dr Hasan-Askari Rizvi
Friday sermons in a large number of mosques preach how the West is out to undermine the Muslims and the Islamic world. It is easy to get radical ideological inspiration in Pakistan because Islamic orthodoxy and militancy have seeped deep into Pakistan’s state system and society

Dawn, FBI seek access to Shahzad’s father
The US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) team investigating Faisal Shahzad’s case has visited Pabbi, Nowshera and Hassanabdal on Saturday and seeks access to Shahzad’s father.

II. ON THE OUTSIDE

NYT, Imam’s Path From Condemning Terror to Preaching Jihad
Anwar al-Awlaki, a U.S.-born cleric, has become a central figure in the luring of Western Muslims to violent extremism.

The Express Tribune, Will the real Zaid Hamid please stand up? –Amber Rahim Shamsi
If the Afghan jihad — funded and supported by the CIA and the ISI to fight the infidel communists — is pivotal in Pakistan’s history, it is also the case in Hamid’s biography.

The Daily Times, VIEW: Legally unjust? —Andleeb Abbas
Capacity building of the bureaucrats has become a lottery for most of the high-ranking officials where each one is going to prestigious universities like Harvard, Stanford and Princeton at exorbitant costs

Dawn, OP-ED, Paying for Pakistan–Mohsin Hamid
Here’s the great secret about Pakistan: we aren’t as poor as we like to think. Over the years I’ve travelled a fair bit around our country. I’ve ridden on the back of a motorbike in Gwadar, walked down streets in Karachi, explored bazaars in Peshawar.

The Daily Times, ANALYSIS: The bridge of indignities —Mir Mohammad Ali Talpur
Leaders, both good and bad, have a direct relationship to the level of social and political awakening in the populace. The public is always as good or bad as its leaders because politicians are role models

I. KASAB SENTENCED
News inside and outside Islamabad on Kasab, the lone surviving gunman behind the Mumbai Attacks being sentenced to death.

Dawn, Ajmal Kasab sentenced to death for Mumbai attacks
MUMBAI: An Indian judge on Thursday condemned to death the sole surviving gunman involved in the 2008 Mumbai siege after a year-long trial over the bloody attacks that traumatised the nation.
DAWN.COM | World | Ajmal Kasab sentenced to death for Mumbai attacks

NYT, Mumbai Gunman Sentenced to Death
MUMBAI: The lone surviving gunman from the 2008 attacks that killed more than 160 people was ordered to be hanged.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/07/world/asia/07mumbai.html

NDTV, Kasab, 26/11 terrorist, breaks down in court
MUMBAI: Ajmal Kasab, who was today awarded death sentence on four counts in the 26/11 terror attack case, broke down after hearing the sentence.
http://www.ndtv.com/news/india/kasab-breaks-down-in-court-23621.php

Hindustan Times, Court gives death penalty to Kasab
MUMBAI: Exactly 528 days after he landed on the city’s coast, with nine other gunmen, and mounted attacks that killed 166 people, a special court on Thursday sentenced Mohammed Ajmal Amir Kasab (22) to death for murder and waging war against the country.
http://www.hindustantimes.com/Killing-machine-Kasab-gets-death-sentence-for-26-11-attacks/H1-Article3-540002.aspx

II. INVESTIGATIONS INTO SHAHZAD CONTINUE

Dawn Editorial, “New York plot”
Worryingly yet another abortive attack in the West has been linked to Pakistan. The arrest of Faisal Shahzad, a 30-year-old Pakistani-born American, has already led to news that he was calling Pakistan in the days leading up to his attempted bombing of Times Square in New York.
DAWN.COM | Editorial | New York plot

NYT, Money Woes, Long Silences and a Zeal for Islam
Theirs was an arranged marriage: two well-educated children of prominent Pakistani families set up through a mutual friend. He was the quiet one; she was the one who laughed at parties.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/06/nyregion/06profile.html

CBS News, The Pakistani Connection
Pakistani police made several arrests in Karachi that they believe are relations of Faisal Shahzad. Mandy Clark reports.

Watch CBS News Videos Online

CNN Money, Faisal Shahzad’s $65,000 home equity piggy bank
SHELTON, Conn. (CNNMoney.com) — Faisal Shahzad lived on the downslope side of affluence in the small Connecticut hamlet of Shelton. On Monday, while Shahzad sits in a jail cell in downtown New York City, a judge is scheduled to foreclose on his home, clipping Shahzad’s last attachment to the American dream.
http://money.cnn.com/2010/05/06/real_estate/Shahzad_foreclosure/index.htm?cnn=yes&hpt=T2

Newsweek, Pakistan Taliban Source: Times Square Bombing Attempt Was ‘Revenge Against America’
A top Afghan Taliban planner and organizer tells NEWSWEEK he wasn’t surprised by the attempted car bombing in Times Square. “We were expecting this,” says the source, who operates on both sides of the porous Afghanistan-Pakistan border.

http://blog.newsweek.com/blogs/declassified/archive/2010/05/06/times-square-bombing-hakimullah-wanted-to-come-back-with-a-bang-taliban-source-says.aspx

How did a 30-year-old American immigrant with two small children end up attempting to use a weapon of mass destruction to kill and maim people around Times Square?

That is the question I hope people will be asking.

That is the question I wish Pakistanis and American Pakistanis had asked as soon as it became known that the individual behind the botched NY bomb scare was a Pakistani-born American citizen.

Instead widespread frustration and a large, “why me?” syndrome echoed across blogs, Twitter and Facebook pages. Pakistani’s and Pakistani Americans were and are saying things like,

“this is sooooo embarrassing!”

“Thanks for making my life more difficult!”

“I’m sick of defending my religion and and the actions of ‘some’ Pakistanis to my fellow Americans”

A Pakistani friend of mine who lives in NY actually posted “the guy should be castrated and hung” on his Facebook page. An opinion like that coming from within a country of freedom, liberty and innocent until proven guilty, is the deepest disappointment.

Faisal Shahzad came to the US on a student visa in 1998 to attend Bridgeport University. He wasn’t the best student but managed to graduate with a Computer Information Systems Bachelor’s degree from a college that is ranked as a Tier 4 school by US News.

An NYT investigation revealed that the make-up giant Elizabeth Arden applied for a visa for Shahzad.

In January 2002 manned with a H1B, a work visa for three years, Shahzad started working in their accounting department.

Two years later he married Huma Mian, an American Pakistani from Boulder, Colorado. It is not clear whether this was an arranged marriage.

But from pictures and comments on the internet it seems they were in love.

Reports suggest they were both Pathan and both of them listed Pushto in their spoken languages on a social networking site. In a report in Dawn, “Shahzad’s village in KPkhwa shocked”, villagers in Nowshera said Shahzad’s wife was from Mardan.

Blogs and papers have reported that she described herself on her Facebook page as a “not political” individual who likes to “party every night.” In a picture she had uploaded of her husband, reads the caption, “my everything.” Her facebook profile has since then been taken down.

Soon after they married they bought a home in Shelton, Connecticut in July of 2004. According to court papers, they bought the house by taking out a mortgage for $218,400 from Chase Manhattan Mortgage Corp. Last September, the mortgage company began foreclosure proceedings. As of December 14, 2009, Shahzad and Mian owed $207,837.

In 2005, Mian petitioned to have her husband’s immigration status changed and to get the ball rolling on his naturalization. In the summer of that same year Shahzad earned an MBA degree from Bridgeport University.

Elizabeth Arden confirmed to the NYT that Shahzad left their company in June of 2006. He took up a job as a junior financial analyst at Affinion Group in Norwalk, a financial marketing services company.

In April of 2009, he raised his right hand, he swore the oath of citizenship before a magistrate and became a citizen of the United States.

By this time the couple had two small children.

Michael Bush, the Affinion Group’s director of public relations, said Mr. Shahzad resigned in mid-2009.

In the NYT article, “From Suburban Father to Terrorism Suspect”, neighbors suggest that the couple was not in the best financial state and left their home in a hurry,

“The family had several tag sales last summer, offering knickknacks and kid stuff, “things that you would give to Goodwill,” said Mary Ann Galich, 55, who lives behind the house.

“She was outside dealing with the people, and he was dealing with the money,” Ms. Galich recalled.

Davon Reid, 17, who lives next door, said the family moved in December: “It seemed like they picked up everything very quickly.” ”

Shahzad returned to the US February of this year. He told immigration officials he had been in Pakistan for a 5-month visit to his family and that he had returned intending to find a job and a place to live. He soon signed a year-long lease for a two-bedroom apartment in Bridgeport, Connecticut. This was the apartment that Shahzad lived in till he confessed to the Times Square bombing attempt.

The American dream just wasn’t for Faisal Shahzad. But it isn’t for many people, especially in these economic conditions. To me, his economic worries are hardly comparable to those of every third person in Pakistan living on less than a dollar a day.

The question is what led him to turn from a smiling father of two, to planting an explosive-laden vehicle at Times Square in an attempt to ruthlessly and brutally terrorize and kill.

If the young suicide bombers in Pakistan are brainwashed, what happened to this 30- year-old who had lived, studied, and worked in the US for more than a third of his life?

The same question applies to the 5 college students from Virginia arrested in Pakistan, and Major Hasan Nidal.

While most online posts have painted Faisal Shahzad’s case in black in white, some (the LA Times and the NYT) have offered some insight into the man. I hope all Americans, Muslims or not, of Pakistani origin or not, can gain their own understanding of how people like Faisal Shahzad become what they become and what we can do to stop it from happening in the future.

Pakistan had its chance when the Mumbai terror trail led to Pakistan through Ajmal Kasab. But Pakistani authorities in their regular denial mode, refused to even accept he was a citizen as was reported in Indian media. They were forced to accept the Kasab was indeed Pakistani and from Faridkot after an independent Dawn investigation, revealed as much. Unfortunately, irresponsible journalism in the rest of Pakistan’s media did not trump the Dawn investigation for most people in Pakistan.

On May 1, 2010, Dawn reported,

“Farmers in the remote impoverished home town of the surviving gunman of the Mumbai massacre angrily denounced his conviction as a travesty of justice at the hands of “infidel” India.”

Unless we don’t start recognizing and understanding the people responsible for terror and their motivations behind committing horrific acts of terror, we are always going to be outside a solution to the problem.

READ: Evidence Mounts for Taliban Role in Car Bomb Plot

READ: START MAY 2010 Terrorism Report

READ: Salon.com, What I understand about Faisal Shahzad

In record time, 53 hours the FBI investigation team did a phenomenal job of linking and arresting Pakistani-born Shahzad to the smoldering, explosive-laden Nissan Pathfinder by following his sloppy trail of evidence.

An FBI special agent describes the gripping tale in Official Complaint, US VS. Shahzad

Twenty-four hours after fertilizer, propane, fireworks, and wires among other things are found in a SUV on 45th Street and 7th Avenue, FBI agents locate the Nissan’s last owner, through the Vehicle ID Number (VIN). An interview with the owner on May 2nd reveals that the vehicle had been sold to a man a week earlier. The man had contacted the seller through phone and the sale was done in a parking lot on April 24th. The seller’s description of the buyer leads to a sketch. A day later, FBI agents ask the seller to ID the buyer from an array of 6 photos. The seller identifies one of them, Faisal Shahzad from Bridgeport Connecticut, as the buyer of the Pathfinder.

The number Shahzad used to contact the seller, also received calls from a Pakistani number, a number that the US Customs and Border Protection has listed as a number for Shahzad in Pakistan. This Pakistani number called Shahzad four times on April 24th, the day he bought the SUV.

His phone records also show he called a fireworks store in rural Pennsylvania, a day after he drove off with his Pathfinder.

After Shahzad was identified as the owner of the Pathfinder, he is put under surveillance according to the NYT.

FBI agents soon make their way to Shahzads residence.

One of the keys left in the Pathfinder in Times Square, turns out to be keys to his home. Agents interview the landlord, who says he saw Shahzad leaving his garage earlier that day (May 3rd.) He says he also saw two bags of fertilizer in the garage. The FBI searched the garage and find fireworks and fertilizer.

An NYT investigation has revealed that at around noon on May 3rd, investigators asked Homeland Security to put Shahzad on a no-fly list. Three minutes later airlines including Emirates were asked to check for updates on the no-fly list. At 4:30 pm the department sent airlines more details including Shahzad’s passport number. At 6:30 pm Shahzad called Emirates and booked a flight to Pakistan via Dubai. At 7:35 pm he arrived at the airport paid for the ticket in cash and received a boarding pass. Apparently, emirates staff hadn’t checked the updated no fly list.

Once boarding on Flight EK202 was complete, the final passenger list was sent to the Customs and Borders Protection at 11 pm. They sounded the alarm that Shazad was on a flight that was about to take off.

The ATC soon contacted the EK 202 crew and told them they were being recalled to the Gate.

As Shahzad was hurled off the plane, he confessed to planting explosives in the car left at Times Square and recently receiving bomb training in Waziristan. He also said the car he drove to the airport in, had a gun. Agents recovered that gun among other things from inside the car.

Why did Shahzad leave such an obvious witness and evidence trail? Did Shahzad really think he could get away on a commercial flight via Dubai to Pakistan? Was he planning on returning to his wife and two kids in Pakistan? What was this guy thinking? That’s what I’m thinking.

READ: How Faisal Shahzad was Caught, The Huffington Post

WATCH: Holder on Suspect confessing, CNN

READ: Pakistan arrests relatives of NY bomb suspect, Dawn

READ: Failed New York bomb puts Pakistan under spotlight, Dawn

UN Report on Benazir Bhutto’s Assassination

Excerpt from Report

The Commission has come to the following findings:

i. After nine years in exile, former Prime Minister Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto
returned to Pakistan on 18 October 2007, during an exceptionally violent year,
marked by sharp increases in violence carried out both by Islamist extremists
and by the state. She returned in the context of a tenuous and inconclusive
political agreement with General Pervez Musharraf, as part of a process
encouraged and facilitated by the governments of the United Kingdom and the
United States. While their discussions included the issue of an eventual
power sharing arrangement, the final terms were never agreed. Indeed, the
Commission received no compelling evidence that, by the time of her
assassination, either Ms Bhutto or General Musharraf believed that she or he
still needed the support of the other to achieve their ultimate political goals.

ii. Ms Bhutto was murdered on 27 December 2007 when a 15 and a half
year-old suicide bomber detonated his explosives near her vehicle as she was
leaving the PPP event at Liaquat Bagh. No one believes that this boy acted
alone. A range of government officials failed profoundly in their efforts first
to protect Ms Bhutto and second to investigate with vigour all those
responsible for her murder, not only in the execution of the attack, but also in
its conception, planning and financing.

iii. Responsibility for Ms Bhutto’s security on the day of her assassination
rested with the federal Government, the government of Punjab and the
Rawalpindi District Police. None of these entities took necessary measures to
respond to the extraordinary, fresh and urgent security risks that they knew
she faced.

iv. The federal Government under General Musharraf, although fully aware
of, and tracking, the serious threats to Ms Bhutto’s security, did little more
than pass on those threats to her and provincial authorities and were not
proactive in neutralizing them or ensuring that the security provided was
commensurate to the threats. The federal Government failed in its primary
responsibility to provide effective protection to Ms Bhutto on her return to
Pakistan.

v. The federal Government lacked a comprehensive security plan for Ms
Bhutto, relying instead on provincial authorities, but then failed to issue to
them the necessary instructions. Particularly inexcusable was the
Government’s failure to direct provincial authorities to provide Ms Bhutto the
same stringent and specific security measures it ordered on 22 October 2007
for two other former prime ministers who belonged to the main political party
supporting General Musharraf. This discriminatory treatment is profoundly
troubling given the devastating attempt on her life only three days earlier and
the specific threats against her which were being tracked by the ISI.

vi. Ms Bhutto’s assassination on 27 December 2007 could have been
prevented if the Rawalpindi District Police had taken adequate security
measures. The security arrangements for Ms Bhutto by the Rawalpindi
District Police were ineffective and insufficient. The police’s security plan, as
written, was flawed, containing insufficient focus on Ms Bhutto’s protection
and focusing instead on the deployment of police for crowd control purposes.
In many respects, the security plan was not implemented. Although the plan
called for deploying 1,371 police officers, the actual deployment did not
approach that number. Among other failings: the police co-ordinated poorly
with the PPP’s own security; police escort units did not protect Ms Bhutto’s
vehicle as tasked; parked police vehicles blocked the emergency route; and,
the police took grossly inadequate steps to clear the crowd so that Ms Bhutto’s
vehicle would have safe passage on leaving Liaquat Bagh. The performance
of individual police officers and police leadership was poor in areas of
forward planning, accountability and command and control.

vii. The additional security arrangements of the PPP lacked leadership and
were inadequate and poorly executed. The Commission recognizes the
heroism of individual PPP supporters, many of whom sacrificed themselves to
protect Ms Bhutto. However, Ms Bhutto was left vulnerable in a severely
damaged vehicle that was unable to transport her to the hospital by the
irresponsible and hasty departure of the bullet-proof Mercedes-Benz which, as
the back-up vehicle, was an essential part of her convoy.

viii. The Rawalpindi District Police’s actions and omissions in the immediate
aftermath of the assassination of Ms Bhutto, including the hosing down of the
crime scene and failure to collect and preserve evidence, inflicted irreparable
damage to the investigation. The collection of 23 pieces of evidence was
manifestly inadequate in a case that should have resulted in thousands. The
one instance in which the authorities reviewed these actions, the Punjab
committee of inquiry into the hosing down of the crime scene was a whitewash.
Hosing down the crime scene so soon after the blast goes beyond
mere incompetence; it is up to the relevant authorities to determine whether
this amounts to criminal responsibility. Furthermore, CPO Saud Aziz
impeded some Joint Investigation Team investigators from conducting on-site
investigations until two full days after the assassination. The failure of
provincial authorities to otherwise review effectively the gross failures of the
senior Rawalpindi police officials and deal with them appropriately
constitutes a broader whitewash by Punjab officials.

ix. The deliberate prevention by CPO Saud Aziz of a post mortem
examination of Ms Bhutto hindered a definitive determination of the cause of
her death. It was patently unrealistic for the CPO to expect that Mr Zardari
would allow an autopsy on his arrival in Pakistan at Chaklala Airbase nearly
seven hours after his wife’s death and after her remains had been placed in a
coffin and brought to the airport. The autopsy should have been carried out at
Rawalpindi General Hospital long before Mr Zardari arrived.

x. The Commission is persuaded that the Rawalpindi police chief, CPO Saud
Aziz, did not act independently of higher authorities, either in the decision to
hose down the crime scene or to impede the post-mortem examination.

xi. The Government press conference conducted by Brigadier Cheema on 28
December 2007, the day after the assassination, was ordered by General
Musharraf. The Government’s assertion that Ms Bhutto’s death was caused
when she hit her head on the lever of her vehicle’s escape hatch and that
Baitullah Mehsud and Al-Qaida were responsible for the suicide bomber were
made well before any proper investigation had been initiated. This action pre-
empted, prejudiced and hindered the subsequent investigation.

xii. An unequivocal determination as to the cause and means of Ms Bhutto’s
death would have required an autopsy. The Commission has uncovered no
new evidence to suggest a gunshot injury to Ms Bhutto. Instead, a senior PPP
official who publicly purported soon after the assassination to have seen
indications of a bullet injury admitted to the Commission that she did not have
direct knowledge of such an injury.

xiii. Ms Bhutto faced serious threats in Pakistan from a number of sources;
these included Al-Qaida, the Taliban and local jihadi groups, and potentially
from elements in the Pakistani Establishment. Notwithstanding these threats,
the investigation into her assassination focused on pursuing lower level
operatives allegedly linked to Baitullah Mehsud. The Commission finds it
disturbing that little was done to investigate Baitullah Mehsud himself, Al-
Qaida and any individuals or organizations that might have worked on,
supported or otherwise been involved directly or indirectly in the planning or
execution of the assassination. Investigators also dismissed the possibility of
involvement by elements of the Establishment, including the three persons
identified by Ms Bhutto as threats to her in her 16 October 2007 letter to
General Musharraf.

xiv. The Commission has identified other significant flaws in the Joint
Investigation Team investigation led by the Punjab Additional Inspector
General Abdul Majeed. It lacked direction, was ineffective and suffered from
a lack of commitment to identify and bring all of the perpetrators to justice.
This delay further hampered the gathering of evidence. Despite indications
that there are links between the Karachi and Rawalpindi attacks, there has
essentially been no communication between the investigators on those two
cases.

xv. The investigation was severely hampered by intelligence agencies and
other government officials, which impeded an unfettered search for the truth.
Despite their explanation to the Commission that they do not have a mandate
to conduct criminal investigations, intelligence agencies including the Inter-
Services Intelligence agency (ISI) were present during key points in the police
investigation, including the gathering of evidence at the crime scene and the
forensic examination of Ms Bhutto’s vehicle, playing a role that the police
were reluctant to reveal to the Commission.

xvi. More significantly, the ISI conducted parallel investigations, gathering
evidence and detaining suspects. Evidence gathered from such parallel
investigations was selectively shared with the police. What little direction
police investigators had was provided to them by the intelligence agencies.
However, the bulk of the information was not shared with police investigators.
In fact, investigators on both the Karachi and Rawalpindi cases were unaware
of information the ISI possessed about terrorist cells targeting Ms Bhutto and
were unaware that the ISI had detained four persons in late October 2007 for
the Karachi attack.

xvii. More broadly, no aspect of the Commission’s inquiry was untouched by
credible assertions of politicized and clandestine action by the intelligence
services – the ISI, Military Intelligence, and the Intelligence Bureau. On
virtually every issue the Commission addressed, intelligence agencies played
a pervasive role, including a central involvement in the political negotiations
regarding Ms Bhutto’s return to Pakistan and the conduct of the elections.

xviii. The Commission believes that the failures of the police and other officials
to react effectively to Ms Bhutto’s assassination were, in most cases,
deliberate. In other cases, the failures were driven by uncertainty in the minds
of many officials as to the extent of the involvement of intelligence agencies.
These officials, in part fearing involvement by the intelligence agencies, were
unsure of how vigorously they ought to pursue actions that they knew, as
professionals, they should have taken.

Video from December 27 2007 Attack
Najam Sethi’s Editorial in the Friday Times April 30 2010
Cyril Almeida’s Op-Ed in Dawn May 1 2010