Bhutto probe: questions remain

Last Modified: 08 Feb 2008
By: Jonathan Rugman

Scotland Yard backs the official version of Benazir Bhutto's death, saying the blast forced her head onto the car and she had no bullet wounds.

Scotland Yard admit their report was complicated by the lack of an extended and detailed search of the Bhutto death crime scene and absence of an autopsy.

Benazir Bhutto's killing spawned conspiracy theories from the off. And when Channel 4 News broadcast footage appearing to show she was shot even President Musharraf admitted there were questions about the official explanation.

Pictures are the best visual account we have of Benazir Bhutto's final moments waving to an adoring crowd of several hundred from the sunroof of her car after a rally in Rawalpindi.

We understand Scotland Yard detectives viewed this footage last week and that it formed a key piece of evidence in their investigation.

The man in sunglasses in the footage in question is Bhutto's assassin. In the chaos he's moving towards his target. There is no police cordon to stop him, though three officers are just a few feet behind the killer.

When he's close to his prey he pulls out a pistol. We can hear three shots and then an exploding bomb. And this is the last time we see Benazir Bhutto, falling through the roof of her car.

Astonishingly the cameraman keeps filming. Survivors are crying out for help. Lying on the ground are some of the 21 dead. This is just one of 140 suicide attacks in Pakistan last year.

It had been suggested that two killers, a gunman and a suicide bomber, were in the crowd. But Scotland Yard say they believe the man in sunglasses was Benazir Bhutto's sole assassin.

The report makes this conclusion that this is because "body parts from only one individual remain unidentified....the bombing suspect was within one to two metres of the vehicle".

The report says the protective metal doors or escape hatches through which Mrs Bhutto fell were 9cm thick.

Scotland Yard quotes the Home Office's pathologist as saying that she died "as a result of a severe head injury sustained as a consequence of the bomb blast and due to head impact somewhere in the escape hatch of the vehicle".

But if you look at our footage it appears as if Mrs Bhutto has fallen inside the vehicle before the bomb blast.

Detectives also analysed our footage and at first seem to agree. Their report says that her "head did not completely disappear from view until 0.6 seconds before the blast".

But though she had apparently disappeared before the explosion the report says "the overwhelming conclusion must be that she did not succeed in getting her head entirely below the lip of the escape hatch when the explosion occurred".

So how can it be that Bhutto was killed by an explosion even though so much of her body had disappeared inside her bomb proof car before the blast? A former police ballistic expert told us she was most likely hit by the bomb's very first shockwaves typically travelling over 6,000 metres in a single second.

So Scotland Yard has backed the Pakistani government's version of events. Contradicting the doubters who say Bhutto was shot.

But will this be enough to stop the conspiracy theorists among Bhutto's weeping supporters who fear a government cover up?

Probably not, for there was no autopsy at the time of death. Detectives admit a search of the crime scene was impossible because it was hosed down within hours of the attack. The only hospital x rays Scotland Yard saw were of Bhutto's head.

Yet passengers inside the car say she was hit by a bullet in the neck, as does an MP from Bhutto's Pakistan People's Party who helped wash the body for burial.

Wajid Shamsul Hasan, former adviser to Benazir Bhutto said: "We understand that these detectives never wanted this investigation. That it was always bound to be a poisoned chalice, rejected by those who still believe a trained gunman backed by the Pakistani government was involved in Bhutto's murder."