Former prime minister Benazir Bhutto called for the US and Britain to help investigate a suicide bombing that killed 139 people as she made her first public appearance since the assassination attempt.
She warned that Taliban and al-Qaeda militants have gained ground in Pakistan but said Thursday's bombing could unite her and other forces opposed to extremism, including President General Pervez Musharraf.
"He's been the victim of assassination attacks and so have we," Bhutto told a small group of journalists on Sunday inside her heavily guarded Karachi residence. "I think certainly it will unite all those who are against extremism."
Bhutto's return from an eight-year exile follows negotiations with Musharraf that could bring the longtime rivals together after January elections and see the corruption charges against her vanish.
Bhutto, who is vying to become prime minister for a third time, has kept up her strong rhetoric against military rule and accuses elements within Musharraf's administration of plotting to kill her.
But that has been tempered by some conciliatory comments, suggesting that she views an alliance with Musharraf -- a key US ally in its war on terrorism -- as her political destiny, one with the backing of Western governments.
Bhutto returned to Pakistan on Thursday, but her jubilant greeting by more than 150,000 supporters was shattered by the bombing just before midnight.
Using a device laden with nuts, bolts and ball bearings, the attacker, who has yet to be identified, killed about 50 of her party's security detail, at least 18 police escorting her and scores of supporters and bystanders.
Three days after the carnage, the former prime minister swiftly popped out of her fortified home to visit some of the wounded at a Karachi hospital, then visited a shrine in one of the poorest quarters of the volatile city.
Hundreds of supporters chanted "Prime Minister Benazir!" as she left after the 15-minute hospital visit, guarded by armed police.
She also held prayers of mourning at her house with about 100 women, many of them widowed in Thursday's attack, while thousands of her supporters gathered for a prayer service elsewhere in Karachi. Some shouted for revenge but the cleric leading the prayers appealed for calm. Hundreds more gathered in Peshawar and Lahore.
Bhutto conceded she felt a little weary but appeared upbeat when she met reporters in a lounge adorned with photos of polo horses and a pencil sketch of her husband Asif Ali Zardari, who still lives abroad.
She said she had been lucky to escape injury in the attack as she was at the back of the interior of her armored truck when the bomb went off, but found her ear bleeding the morning after.
She urged Britain and the US to lend expertise for the investigation, and called for an independent inquiry into why many streetlights were not working when her convoy was inching its way through the darkness.
"We believe it was sabotage," she said.
Archeologists in Peru on Thursday said they found the 5,000-year-old remains of a noblewoman at the sacred city of Caral, revealing the important role played by women in the oldest center of civilization in the Americas. “What has been discovered corresponds to a woman who apparently had elevated status, an elite woman,” archeologist David Palomino said. The mummy was found in Aspero, a sacred site within the city of Caral that was a garbage dump for more than 30 years until becoming an archeological site in the 1990s. Palomino said the carefully preserved remains, dating to 3,000BC, contained skin, part of the
TRUMP EFFECT: The win capped one of the most dramatic turnarounds in Canadian political history after the Conservatives had led the Liberals by more than 20 points Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney yesterday pledged to win US President Donald Trump’s trade war after winning Canada’s election and leading his Liberal Party to another term in power. Following a campaign dominated by Trump’s tariffs and annexation threats, Carney promised to chart “a new path forward” in a world “fundamentally changed” by a US that is newly hostile to free trade. “We are over the shock of the American betrayal, but we should never forget the lessons,” said Carney, who led the central banks of Canada and the UK before entering politics earlier this year. “We will win this trade war and
‘WATER WARFARE’: A Pakistani official called India’s suspension of a 65-year-old treaty on the sharing of waters from the Indus River ‘a cowardly, illegal move’ Pakistan yesterday canceled visas for Indian nationals, closed its airspace for all Indian-owned or operated airlines, and suspended all trade with India, including to and from any third country. The retaliatory measures follow India’s decision to suspend visas for Pakistani nationals in the aftermath of a deadly attack by shooters in Kashmir that killed 26 people, mostly tourists. The rare attack on civilians shocked and outraged India and prompted calls for action against their country’s archenemy, Pakistan. New Delhi did not publicly produce evidence connecting the attack to its neighbor, but said it had “cross-border” links to Pakistan. Pakistan denied any connection to
Armed with 4,000 eggs and a truckload of sugar and cream, French pastry chefs on Wednesday completed a 121.8m-long strawberry cake that they have claimed is the world’s longest ever made. Youssef El Gatou brought together 20 chefs to make the 1.2 tonne masterpiece that took a week to complete and was set out on tables in an ice rink in the Paris suburb town of Argenteuil for residents to inspect. The effort overtook a 100.48m-long strawberry cake made in the Italian town of San Mauro Torinese in 2019. El Gatou’s cake also used 350kg of strawberries, 150kg of sugar and 415kg of
RSS