Bhutto defiant after bomb attack
Updated on 19 October 2007
After a bomb attack on her convoy in Pakistan, Benazir Bhutto said, "We are prepared to risk our lives. We're prepared to risk our liberty. But we're not prepared to surrender this great nation to militants."
Warning: You may be disturbed by some of the images in the video.
The attack claimed more than 130 lives and the former Prime Minister, who has returned to Pakistan after eight years of exile, described it as an attack on the very integrity of her country.
The top security official in the province, Ghulam Muhammad Mohtarem, said the attack bore the hallmarks of pro-Taliban warlord Baitullah Mehsud and al Qaida.
Ms Bhutto has earned the enmity of fundamentalist groups in Pakistan because of her support for the US-led war on terror.
But one of Mehsud's associates in the lawless north west of Pakistan denied Taliban involvement, saying: "The government's secret agencies are involved in it. This was an effort to provoke common people and create hatred against the Taliban."
A spokesman for Pervez Musharraf said he had expressed his shock and profound grief in a phone call to Ms Bhutto, who was able to return from exile thanks to an amnesty he offered in relation to corruption charges brought in 1999.
He said: "The President and Mrs Bhutto both expressed their unflinching resolve to fight this scourge of extremism and terrorism. They also agreed that there was a need for the entire nation to unite in order to rid the country of this menace of suicide bombings, terrorism and extremism."
General Musharraf resolved to "bring the perpetrators of this heinous crime to justice".
As messages of support flooded in from around the world, a spokesman for United Nations secretary general Ban Ki-moon said he "strongly condemns this terrorist attack and expresses condolences to the families of the victims".
