Bhutto Reported Assassinated
| 12/27/2007 | Posted by Patti under Middle East, World News, World Politics |
Having escaped injury or death in a suicide bombing attack in October on a parade celebrating her return to Pakistan from exile Benazir Bhutto, has been assassinated. Reports from Pakistan indicate that Bhutto was shot in the chest and neck as the entered a vehicle following a rally in Rawalpindi. The attacker then blew himself up killing up to 20 others. Bhutto died a short time later at a local hospital.
Twice Prime Minister of Pakistan, she was the first female elected to lead a post-colonial Muslim state. Both of her tenures were ended by the Pakistani President of the time on charges of corruption. In 1998 she went into exile in Dubai until her return to Pakistan in October. She was running in the Pakistani elections due to be held January 8th.
Born in Karachi in 1953, Bhutto was the daughter of Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, who was the Prime Minister of Pakistan until he was dismissed on similar charges of corruption. He was later hanged by a military dictator. Bhutto completed her early education in Pakistan and went on to obtain degrees from Harvard University in the US and Oxford University in England.
She first came to power in Pakistan in 1988 at the age of 35 years old. Controversy seems to have surrounded much of her personal and political life. Regardless of who is right or wrong, this assassination will likely spell civil unrest in Pakistan which is worrisome when our Canadian troops are fighting not that far away in the restive southern provinces of Afghanistan, not far from the Pakistani border.
We need to watch this situation very closely.
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