by The Young Sentinel
Many of us remember how at the end of 2007 Benazir Bhutto, Pakistan's legendary former Prime Minister, returned from exile to run for President. Greeted with two million well wishers, suicide bombers almost destroyed her motorcade. After several other assassination attempts, she was gunned down in the city of Rawalpindi on December 27.
I was listening to the radio that day when the breaking news came that she had been shot. To me, and to millions of others around the world who watched the historic moment of a woman set to unseat President Pervez Musharraf, it came as a blow. Although her previous administration had been charged with much corruption, she symbolized a new direction for Pakistan and the Arab world. Having read her book, which attempts to reconcile Islam with the West, I have been extremely suspicious of the lack of investigation into her death.
The book opens with the suicide bombing of her motorcade in Karachi. She describes how President Musharraf refused to conduct a normal investigation or put in place proper security. After her assassination there were many calls for an international investigation. They came to nothing and Musharraf remained in power.
Now, seven months after her death, the BBC reports that the UN has finally ordered an inquest into Bhutto's death. Even if it comes to nothing, maybe her message of tolerance and cooperation between peaceful Muslims and the West can earn a place in our policy.
Saturday, July 12, 2008
Thought of the Day: Benazir Bhutto
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3 comments:
I agree. From the beginning I believed that Musharraf was directly or indirectly responsible for the death of Benazir Bhutto because of his resilience clinging to power and the fact that the U.S. has been too busy relying on him to route Al Qaida from the Pakistani side of the Afganistan-Pakistan border. If our country had only tried to negotiate with actual diplomatic leverage instead of passive support for Musharraf's fragile militaristic government, Benazir Bhutto might still be alive today as a ray of hope for the volatile Islamic world.
I admire what Mrs. Bhutto did for her country and the world. Mrs. Clinton, who described Ms. Bhutto as “brilliant and striking,” was one of the few who had the opportunity to meet with her. Here is what she said, “Bhutto acknowledged the difficulties faced by women who were breaking with tradition and taking leading roles in public life,” “She deftly managed to refer both to the challenges I had encountered during my White House tenure and to her own situation. ‘Women who take on tough issues and stake out new territory are often on the receiving end of ignorance,’.
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