Benazir’s murder probe extends to Musharraf

Government has decided to expand the scope of probe into the assassination of Shaheed Benazir Bhutto, as a joint investigation team of FIA is in process of dispatching a questionnaire containing 32 queries to former Chief of the Army Staff General Pervez Musharraf

The investigation into the assassination of former prime minister Benazir Bhutto has been extended to former president Gen (r) Pervez Musharraf and a questionnaire carrying 32 questions has been sent to him abroad, a private TV channel reported on Monday.

According to the Daily Times report, the decision has been made under court orders after the Federal Intelligence Agency (FIA) submitted case challan to a Rawalpindi-based anti-terrorism court, which ordered to include the former dictator in the probe. The source said that the questions were related to the security provided to the slain Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) leader, the channel said.

The charge sheet filed by the FIA in the court held the banned group Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) responsible for the attack on December 27, 2007. The investigation team has reportedly asked the former military ruler what steps he had taken to address the issue of serious threats to Benazir’s life regarding which she had written to him before her return to Pakistan. Musharraf was also asked about the evidence, which the then brigadier claimed to have collected and on whose grounds he later addressed a conference holding Baitullah Mehsud responsible for the incident, the channel reported.

“We have prepared a questionnaire for the former president to record his statement,” FIA Director General Waseem Ahmed said, adding: “We want to record the statement of everybody who has any connection with the case.”
Interior ministry sources said the document contained questions relating to security lapse. It asks the former president why did he not provide foolproof security to Ms Bhutto after she had narrowly escaped a bomb blast in Karachi’s Karsaz area on Oct 18, 2007.
Former Rawalpindi SP Ashfaq Anwar, who was Ms Bhutto’s security in-charge at the time of the gun-and-bomb attack in Liaquat Bagh on Dec 27, 2007, is reported to have confessed before the court that adequate security arrangements could have averted the incident.
The questionnaire includes several queries on key issues, private TV quoted its sources as saying.
Referring to a letter written to Musharraf by Shaheed Benazir Bhutto before her return to Pakistan from exile in October 2007 in which she informed him about serious threats to her life, the investigation team reportedly asked the former military ruler what steps he had taken to address this
issue.
In another question, the team asked Musharraf why no foolproof security had been provided by his regime to Bhutto even after the Taliban and al-Qaida issued threats to her and two suicide bombers attacked her homecoming motorcade in Karachi.
The team asked Musharraf why the level of security provided to Benazir Bhutto for her election rally in Rawalpindi was not the same as that for former premier Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain and then Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz.

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