Guardian : The broken bloodline

The broken bloodline

Fatima Bhutto is Benazir's niece. The resemblance is striking: the long nose, the headstrong personality, the burning rage about a father's violent death. Declan Walsh meets the woman who would have been the heir to Benazir's throne - if it weren't for the family feud that came between them

The Guardian | January 11, 2008

Watching him receive a verbal pistol-whipping from Jeremy Paxman at a London press conference this week, it was hard not to feel sorry for Bilawal Bhutto Zardari, the 19-year-old heir to Pakistan's most perilous throne. Did the Oxford fresher really think he was up to the job of heading the Pakistani opposition, even nominally? At home in Pakistan, critics found other faults. "He's not a Bhutto, really, he's a Zardari," muttered a party loyalist, a few days after she was assassinated. "We need a true Bhutto to do the job."

Bilawal may be happy to slip back to Oxford, secret service bodyguards in tow, for another three years. But in Karachi there is another young Bhutto who, if dynasty is your game, seems perhaps better qualified to lead the Pakistani opposition.

Fatima Bhutto is clever, sassy and savours the salty taste of Pakistani public life. She has two books under her belt, writes a punchy newspaper column, and, as a close lieutenant to her vote-seeking mother, is a politician in training. There are some obvious parallels between Fatima and Benazir 30 years ago. Both their lives have been shaped by the untimely and violent deaths of their fathers; both are headstrong, with deep reserves of charm and, when called for, a sense of entitlement. Both are western-educated. The physical resemblance can also be striking. One television interview this week showed Fatima in profile before a portrait of a young Benazir - the same long nose, wide forehead and calm bearing were evident.

Fatima is 25 and eligible to run for public office. (Bilawal must wait another six years.) And for what its worth, she even has the endorsement of Jemima Goldsmith. "At least she has some work experience," wrote Goldsmith, who was once married to cricket star Imran Khan, in last week's Sunday Telegraph. (Goldsmith's expertise in Pakistan, which she left several years ago, was less clear.)

But Fatima says she has no political ambition and, at any rate, is unlikely to eclipse her famous cousin anytime soon. The reasons spring from a half-forgotten chapter of the Bhutto history. It is a story written in broken bloodlines that illuminate the Greek tragedy that this extraordinary South Asian dynasty has become.

Last October, two nights before Benazir was due to return from exile in Dubai, I went to see Fatima and her Lebanese stepmother Ghinwa at their home in Clifton, Karachi's oldest and plushest suburb. They offered a simple dinner - pizza in the box - with apologies: they had just returned from their ancestral home in Larkana, 200 miles to the north, further up the Indus river, where they had been visiting prisoners in the local female jail.

We ate in the upstairs lounge of 70 Clifton, the sprawling house built by Fatima's great-grandfather, Shah Nawaz, in 1954. It reeked of history. Benazir paced these corridors during her detention under the military dictator Zia-ul- Haq in the 70s and 80s. In the garden in 1986, she married Asif Zardari, a polo-playing society lad. Later Benazir would relinquish the house to her brother Murtaza - Fatima's father - but was said still to covet her father Zulfikar's fine library downstairs, rumoured to hold an extensive collection of books about his hero, Napoleon.

That night the city was zinging with excitement. For the first time in years the streets were plastered with Benazir posters, and yahooing men on motorcycles zipped through the traffic, honking their tinny horns. But the gate of 70 Clifton had a lone, defiant poster of Murtaza, who died in a hail of police gunfire in still disputed circumstances in 1996. Since then Fatima and Ghinwa have held Benazir "morally responsible" for his death. The bitterness was palpable and public.

Over dinner, the pair were cheerless at the prospect of her aunt's imminent return. "If she didn't sign the death warrant, then who had the power to cover it up? She did," said Fatima indignantly. In support of her case she cited dead-end investigations, dodgy policemen and the mound of court papers and other testimony about her father's death that she had collected fastidiously in the office next door.

Ghinwa, with a shock of black curls and a supply of long, thin cigarettes, added: "The more there are delays, the more it incriminates those who encouraged those delays."

The origins of the feud stretch back to 1979 and the epochal event that traumatised Pakistan's political psyche and, ultimately, split the Bhutto clan. After the family patriarch Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, a charismatic but flawed prime minister, was hanged by Zia, the military dictator who had deposed him two years earlier, his children scattered. Benazir stayed at home in Pakistan, enduring harsh imprisonment, looking after their ailing mother, Nusrat, and tending to the persecuted People's party that would rise from the ashes after Zia's death nine years later. But Zulfikar's sons, Murtaza and Shah Nawaz, took a different path.

Young, brash and angry, they started Al Zulfikar, or the Sword, an armed movement that sought to overthrow Zia. The revolutionaries shot to fame in 1981 with the hijacking of a Pakistan International Airlines jet that was forced to land in Kabul, where the Bhutto brothers lived in exile under the communist government. The precise details of what unfolded are still disputed, and Murtaza's family claims that he was not involved in the plot (but did act as a negotiator). But a young army officer aboard the plane was executed, some Bhutto supporters were released from jail and flown to Libya, and the brothers became A-list enemies of the powerful military establishment.

Along the way, the Bhutto brothers married two Afghan sisters, the daughters of an Afghan foreign affairs official. Murtaza had a daughter, Fatima, with his wife Fauzia, but they divorced three years later. The brothers flitted to Tripoli then to Europe, sheltering with sympathetic governments. But in 1985 exile took a dark turn when Shah Nawaz, the younger brother, was poisoned during a family holiday in the south of France. The Bhuttos blamed Zia, the CIA, or both.

Murtaza and Fatima found a home in Syria where they met Ghinwa Itoui, a Lebanese woman who had fled the war at home and was giving ballet classes in the basement of a Catholic church. Fatima was among her students. Murtaza and Ghinwa fell in love and married in 1989. At home, Murtaza faced serious allegations, but his daughter idolised him. "He was a wonderful father. We had so much fun," she said, recalling one day when he whipped her out of school for an impromptu excursion to the snow-capped Syrian mountains.

The split came in 1993 when Murtaza ended his 16-year-exile. Sparks flew with Benazir, then elected prime minister for the second time. Murtaza wanted to assume a senior role in her party, possibly the leadership - a demand in keeping with the patriarchal assumptions of the Sindh province's landlord classes. Benazir was having none of it. The rows multiplied, the rift grew deeper, and Murtaza formed a splinter party, which had little success.

It came to a tragic climax three years later, in 1996, when Murtaza, who used to travel with an entourage of armed bodyguards, got into a gunfight with some police, who were ostensibly trying to arrest him. His death rocked Pakistan - another Bhutto dead - and Benazir was said to be distraught. "Our paths were different but our blood is the same," she said. Her government fell six weeks later.

But the grief-stricken Fatima and her mother came to believe that Benazir or her husband, Zardari, had a hand in the killing. Stories circulated that Zardari had had a fight with Murtaza in which his moustache was shaved off - an immense insult. Benazir believed that the shooting had been orchestrated by her enemies. "Kill a Bhutto to get a Bhutto," she told friends. But as with so many political deaths in Pakistan, the truth has never emerged.

Fatima is at great pains to distance herself from her aunt. She did her masters at London's School of African and Oriental Studies, not Oxford, she points out, and instead of heading a debating society, she wrote her dissertation on the resistance movement to Zia. She published a book of poetry, Whispers of the Desert, at the precocious age of 15, followed in 2006 with a collection of stories about the 2005 earthquake that killed 73,000 people in Kashmir and North West Frontier Province. "The comparisons are largely cosmetic," she said. "In terms of political ideology, what we read, how we think, we are very different. I don't think that I'm anything like her."

Her weekly column touches on social and political issues. She won plaudits for her reports of the 2006 war in Lebanon - she was in the country when the fighting started - and keeps a poster of Hizbullah leader Hassan Nasrallah on the door of her office. She yearns to visit Kabul, her birthplace, but her mother discouraged it on grounds of danger.

Benazir clearly loved her niece - her autobiography Daughter of the East has several warm references - but Fatima believes she tried to split the family apart. Benazir disparaged Ghinwa as a "Lebanese belly dancer", and six months after Murtaza's death persuaded Fatima's biological mother, Fauzia, to return to Karachi to seek parental custody. "It was just vulgar and crude," recalled Fatima. "I was in biology class in ninth grade. Then the principal came and said, 'There's a woman here who claims to be your mother.'" Fatima locked herself in the nurse's office as the press swarmed outside. A few years later, Fauzia launched an unsuccessful court bid for custody. She later returned to the US. "It sounds like a soap opera but unfortunately it was very real," said Fatima. "It felt very orchestrated and designed to humiliate."

But she was also keen to distance herself from her aunt's shadow. She didn't like her grievances being aired as a "catfight", she said. "As someone who cares about this country, I'm upset by what's happening. The fact that she's my aunt is just a footnote ... In this country, politics has become entertainment. It's become sleaze, quick and tawdry, because we don't want to talk about things that really matter."

What mattered, she said, was her politics. As she spoke, Ghinwa lit her cigarettes with a box of personalised matches. "For the house of 70 Clifton," read the packet. The box had been printed by a supporter from Ghinwa's political vehicle, the Pakistan People's party - Shaheed Bhutto ("Bhutto the martyr"), which she kept alive after her husband's death. But the flame is barely alive. PPP-SB failed to win even one provincial seat at the last elections. After Benazir's return, and the suicide bombing that killed 140 people, I met Ghinwa again. The rift was raw as ever.

"I hoped that she wouldn't die, of course. I think it will be a bigger punishment for her to live. I feel terrible about all those people, and angry for exposing them like that," she told me.

In life, Benazir was touchy about allegations that she bore any responsibility for Murtaza's death. Instead, she blamed the powerful intelligence services for engineering the killing to split her family. If she was right, the strategy worked spectacularly well. Last month Fatima sent around a link to a YouTube clip of a television interview. It showed Benazir being aggressively questioned about Murtaza's death, breaking into tears and storming out of the studio. "Her reaction is amazing," wrote her estranged niece in an acerbic tone.

Then, two weeks ago, everything changed. In the wake of Benazir's death I found Ghinwa, Fatima and her 17-year-old brother, Zulfikar Ali junior, at the Bhutto ancestral home in Larkana, a 20-minute drive from Benazir's grave. The town centre was still smouldering after the violent reaction to the assassination, and a charred vehicle was parked outside the house. Fatima was shrouded in a black veil, her face was drawn, her cheeks were stained with tears. "It's been a real shock," she said.

Fatima and her mother had been on the election trail, canvassing door to door, when the news broke. She went home and wrote a bittersweet farewell to Benazir for the News. The prose was staccato, the sentiment raw. "My aunt and I had a complicated relationship. That is the sad truth," it started. She remembered fondly that they used to read children's books together, shared a passion for sugared chestnuts and were troubled by the same sort of ear infections. "In death, perhaps there is a moment to call for calm. To say enough ... We cannot, and will not, take this madness any more."

Yesterday Fatima was back in Karachi, still receiving condolences. "My first thought was that it was just too familiar. It felt like we had been through this too many times before," she said by phone. "When I heard that she had been shot in the neck, I thought of my father. The bullet that killed him was also fired into his neck, though at point blank range. It seems like every 10 years we bury a Bhutto killed violently and way before their time."

She had not changed her mind about her father's death, she said. "Her government never adequately explained its role. But now that she's gone ..." She paused. "We'll remember her differently."

But the Bhutto legacy is not at rest yet. Mumtaz Bhutto, the self-described head of the Bhutto clan, stirred the pot recently in suggesting that Fatima's brother, Zulfikar Ali, is the real heir to Benazir's title. But he is highly unlikely to take on the mantle, and Mumtaz's comments may be a product of his longstanding rivalry with Bilawal's father, Zardari. They are also a product of a bygone age - the succession of Bilawal and the bypassing of the bloodline proves that Pakistan opposition politics are about Benazir more than Bhutto.

Soon Fatima and her mother will return to Larkana, to continue the campaign for elections in five weeks' time. "I don't believe in birthright politics," she said. "I don't think, nor have I ever thought, that my name qualifies me for anything. I am political through my writing. I have no interest in parliamentary politics for now. I'm too young. There's a lot to learn".

Farewell Wadi Bua, my aunt

Hindustan Times : Farewell Wadi Bua, my aunt

Fatima Bhutto | December 29, 2007

My aunt and I had a complicated relationship. That is the truth, the sad truth. The last fifteen years were not the ones we spent as friends or as relatives, that is also the truth. But this week, I too want to remember her differently. I want to remember her differently because I must. I can't lose faith in this country, my home. I can't believe that it was for nothing, that violence in its purest form is so cruel and so unforgiving. I can't accept that this is what we have come to. So, I must offer a farewell. One that is written in tears and anger but one that comes from a place far away, from the realm of memory and forgiving — a place where at another time, we might have all been safe. As a child, I used to call my aunt Wadi Bua, Sindhi for father's older sister.

When I got the news, I was told that something had happened to Wadi Bua. It was an expression I hadn't heard or used in a very long time, when I heard it said to me over the phone I remembered someone different.

We used to read children's books together. We used to like exactly the same sweets — sugared chestnuts and candied apples. We used to get the same ear infections that tortured us throughout the years.

I have never before written an article that seemed so impossible. We were very different. Though people liked to compare us, almost instinctively, because well, they could. It is difficult for me to write about two people, one in the present tense and one in the past, at the same time.

Especially when one person's passing makes the other one wonder whether there is a cusp to things and whether or not there really is a past and present to life.

I never agreed with her politics. I never agreed with those she kept around her, the political opportunists, hangers-on, them. They repulse me. I never agreed with her version of events. But in death, perhaps, there is a moment to call for calm. To say, enough. We have had enough.

We cannot, and we will not, take any more madness. I mourn because my family has had enough. I mourn for Bilawal, Bakhtawar, and Asifa. I mourn for them because I too lost a parent. I know what it feels like.

I am at a loss. I am in shock because I have yet to bury a loved one who has died from natural causes. Four. That's the number of family members, immediate family members, whom we have laid to rest, all victims of senseless killing.

I was born five years after my grandfather, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto's assassination.

I was three when my uncle Shahnawaz was murdered. I remember Wadi Bua sitting with me and telling me stories while the rest of the family was with the police.

When I was fourteen, my life was ended. I lost my heart and soul, my father Murtaza. I am and have been since then a shell of the person I was.

I suppose there are cusps in life, and thank god for that because that way we can stay in between.

And now at twenty-five, Wadi. But this isn't about me, it's about those whom we have lost. It's about the graveyard at Garhi Khuda Bux that is just too full.

I pray that this is the last, that from this moment onwards we will no longer have to bid farewell too quickly.

Wadi, farewell.



© Copyright 2007 Hindustan Times

WSJ : Increasing Uncertainty for Pakistan

Increasing Uncertainty for Pakistan

November 14, 2007

How isolated has Pakistan's government become? The country's powerhouse K Street lobbying firm, Cassidy & Associates, abruptly cancelled the $1.2 million contract it had signed with the Pakistani Embassy in Washington just last month in what Legal Times notes is an unusual move. With Pakistan now under de facto martial law and compromise between Pervez Musharraf and the opposition seeming increasingly unlikely, the firm cited what it called "dramatic changes" in withdrawing from the lucrative deal. Pakistan, as Fatima Bhutto, the niece of opposition leader Benazir Bhutto, notes on the Los Angeles Times's op-ed page, is living in "uncertain times."

The younger Ms. Bhutto accuses her aunt of being the best-placed person to benefit from a state of emergency of which she has become the most vocal opponent. "Yes, she now appears to be facing seven days of house arrest, but what does that really mean? While she was supposedly under house arrest at her Islamabad residence last week, 50 or so of her party members were comfortably allowed to join her," Fatima Bhutto writes. "She addressed the media twice from her garden, protected by police given to her by the state, and was not reprimanded for holding a news conference." The two Bhuttos have opposed each other for some time, amid some long-running feuds in the family that founded and controls the Pakistan Peoples Party. A senior government official said today that Ms. Bhutto would remain under house arrest for at least another day.

Meanwhile, Gen. Musharraf insists in an interview with the New York Times that the state of emergency is the best way to ensure the country can hold free and fair elections, and he rejects an appeal from U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to lift it. "I totally disagree with her," he says, offering what the Times describes as a vigorous defense of his suspension of the constitution, his dismissal of the Supreme Court, the silencing of independent news stations and the arrests of at least 2,500 opposition party members, lawyers and human-rights advocates. Gen. Musharraf also declined to say when he'll step down as leader of the military -- as demanded by President Bush during a phone call between the two leaders last week -- instead promising, as he has off and on for years, that "It will happen soon."

LA Times : Aunt Benazir's false promises

Aunt Benazir's false promises

Bhutto's return bodes poorly for Pakistan -- and for democracy there.

By Fatima Bhutto | November 14, 2007

KARACHI -- We Pakistanis live in uncertain times. Emergency rule has been imposed for the 13th time in our short 60-year history. Thousands of lawyers have been arrested, some charged with sedition and treason; the chief justice has been deposed; and a draconian media law -- shutting down all private news channels -- has been drafted.

Perhaps the most bizarre part of this circus has been the hijacking of the democratic cause by my aunt, the twice-disgraced former prime minister, Benazir Bhutto. While she was hashing out a deal to share power with Gen. Pervez Musharraf last month, she repeatedly insisted that without her, democracy in Pakistan would be a lost cause. Now that the situation has changed, she's saying that she wants Musharraf to step down and that she'd like to make a deal with his opponents -- but still, she says, she's the savior of democracy.

The reality, however, is that there is no one better placed to benefit from emergency rule than she is. Along with the leaders of prominent Islamic parties, she has been spared the violent retributions of emergency law. Yes, she now appears to be facing seven days of house arrest, but what does that really mean? While she was supposedly under house arrest at her Islamabad residence last week, 50 or so of her party members were comfortably allowed to join her. She addressed the media twice from her garden, protected by police given to her by the state, and was not reprimanded for holding a news conference. (By contrast, the very suggestion that they might hold a news conference has placed hundreds of other political activists under real arrest, in real jails.)

Ms. Bhutto's political posturing is sheer pantomime. Her negotiations with the military and her unseemly willingness until just a few days ago to take part in Musharraf's regime have signaled once and for all to the growing legions of fundamentalists across South Asia that democracy is just a guise for dictatorship.

It is widely believed that Ms. Bhutto lost both her governments on grounds of massive corruption. She and her husband, a man who came to be known in Pakistan as "Mr. 10%," have been accused of stealing more than $1 billion from Pakistan's treasury. She is appealing a money-laundering conviction by the Swiss courts involving about $11 million. Corruption cases in Britain and Spain are ongoing.

It was particularly unappealing of Ms. Bhutto to ask Musharraf to bypass the courts and drop the many corruption cases that still face her in Pakistan. He agreed, creating the odiously titled National Reconciliation Ordinance in order to do so. Her collaboration with him was so unsubtle that people on the streets are now calling her party, the Pakistan People's Party, the Pervez People's Party. Now she might like to distance herself, but it's too late.

Why did Ms. Bhutto and her party cronies demand that her corruption cases be dropped, but not demand that the cases of activists jailed during the brutal regime of dictator Zia ul-Haq (from 1977 to 1988) not be quashed? What about the sanctity of the law? When her brother Mir Murtaza Bhutto -- my father -- returned to Pakistan in 1993, he faced 99 cases against him that had been brought by Zia's military government. The cases all carried the death penalty. Yet even though his sister was serving as prime minister, he did not ask her to drop the cases. He returned, was arrested at the airport and spent the remaining years of his life clearing his name, legally and with confidence, in the courts of Pakistan.

Ms. Bhutto's repeated promises to end fundamentalism and terrorism in Pakistan strain credulity because, after all, the Taliban government that ran Afghanistan was recognized by Pakistan under her last government -- making Pakistan one of only three governments in the world to do so.

And I am suspicious of her talk of ensuring peace. My father was a member of Parliament and a vocal critic of his sister's politics. He was killed outside our home in 1996 in a carefully planned police assassination while she was prime minister. There were 70 to 100 policemen at the scene, all the streetlights had been shut off and the roads were cordoned off. Six men were killed with my father. They were shot at point-blank range, suffered multiple bullet wounds and were left to bleed on the streets.

My father was Benazir's younger brother. To this day, her role in his assassination has never been adequately answered, although the tribunal convened after his death under the leadership of three respected judges concluded that it could not have taken place without approval from a "much higher" political authority.

I have personal reasons to fear the danger that Ms. Bhutto's presence in Pakistan brings, but I am not alone. The Islamists are waiting at the gate. They have been waiting for confirmation that the reforms for which the Pakistani people have been struggling have been a farce, propped up by the White House. Since Musharraf seized power in 1999, there has been an earnest grass-roots movement for democratic reform. The last thing we need is to be tied to a neocon agenda through a puppet "democrat" like Ms. Bhutto.

By supporting Ms. Bhutto, who talks of democracy while asking to be brought to power by a military dictator, the only thing that will be accomplished is the death of the nascent secular democratic movement in my country. Democratization will forever be de-legitimized, and our progress in enacting true reforms will be quashed. We Pakistanis are certain of this.

Fatima Bhutto is a Pakistani poet and writer. She is the daughter of Mir Murtaza Bhutto, who was killed in 1996 in Karachi when his sister, Benazir, was prime minister.

Times of India : The daughter and the dictator

The daughter and the dictator

Benazir Bhutto is no champion of democracy, says her niece Fatima Bhutto

November 18, 2007

Politics has often been called the theatre of the absurd and nowhere is that more true today than in my country, Pakistan. General Pervez Musharraf, who seized power in 1999, has launched a post-modern coup, declaring emergency rule against his own administration last week. The only parties who stand to benefit from the emergency are the government and their allies. Contrary to what is reported in the Western press, one of these very beneficiaries is a twice-disgraced former Prime Minister, Benazir Bhutto.

Ms Bhutto’s dealings with the military have spared her (along with the leaders of several Islamic parties) from seriously suffering under this most recent emergency rule, which has been absolute and brutal. Ms Bhutto is allowed to speak freely - often holding impromptu press conferences in the gardens of her residences and giving long interviews to foreign news outlets. True, her movement has been restrained in recent days, but it doesn’t go much farther than that.

The state has not treated her with the same vigilance that Asma Jahangir, for instance, the head of Pakistan’s Human Rights Commission has endured. Mrs Jahangir, who has been placed under a 90-day lockdown, does not enjoy the same lax detainment that Ms Bhutto does, with her party officials coming and going to keep her company.

Ms Bhutto is desperate to be seen in the light of Aung San Suu Kyi, but there is no comparison between the two women. Ms Bhutto’s obsequious dealings with the military in Pakistan has led people on the streets of Karachi to nickname her party, the Pakistan People’s Party, the Pervez People’s Party. In her latest bout of flip flops, Ms Bhutto, who returned to Pakistan after eight years of self-imposed exile through a deal with Gen Musharraf, has reversed her previous proclamations.

“I will not be Musharraf’s future Prime Minister,” Ms Bhutto said on Tuesday, followed by an ominous pause. “Even if I wanted to, I would not have the popular support. Everything he touches becomes contaminated.” This is certainly true of Ms Bhutto, who by negotiating with the military in the hopes of being ushered into the Prime Minister’s office for the third time has actively fostered an unviable, undemocratic state in Pakistan.

Beloved by the West for her charm and crisp English accent, Ms Bhutto has reinvented herself as a champion of democracy. She has insisted constantly that our country has no democratic future without her; think of her as a democratic Mother Teresa.

However, nothing is further from the truth. The terms of her deal with the military are profoundly undemocratic. Ms Bhutto, who lost both her governments on grounds of massive corruption, demanded two things from Gen Musharraf: the first was that all her corruption charges be unilaterally dropped. She bypassed the judiciary entirely, crippling the very essence of our legal system and asked to be placed above the law of the land.

Musharraf indulged Ms Bhutto by passing the repellent National Reconciliation Ordinance, which has erased twenty years' corruption charges against politicians and includes a provision that guarantees future cases cannot be easily lodged against sitting parliamentarians.

The ordinance was being contested in the Supreme Court, but with the emergency came the announcement that all laws passed prior to the declaration can no longer be legally challenged. Yet another dictatorial bonus for Ms Bhutto.

Her corruption surpasses even our own borders: Ms Bhutto has gone truly global. She was convicted by Swiss courts for taking roughly $11 millions dollars in kickbacks in the Cotecna corruption case (a ruling she is currently appealing).

In addition, Ms Bhutto faces a money laundering trial in Spain, a property commission’s case in England, and has been accused of giving $ 2 million in kickbacks to Saddam Hussein’s regime through the Oil for Food program. Imagine the kind of leader capable of bribing Saddam. It’s not pretty. But thanks to the ordinance and her deal with Musharraf, Ms. Bhutto is not accountable for her domestic crimes nor is she answerable for them.

Her second demand was that the constitution, already mauled by successive military governments, be amended to make two significant changes in her favour. The first—spoken like a true democrat—was that the two-term limit for the prime ministership be dropped and the second sought the removal of Article 582b.

The article, which allows the President to depose his Prime Minister, does nothing to further democracy, it only goes to safeguard centralised power. We Pakistanis do not want the President to have ultimate power, nor do we want the Prime Minster to have absolute reign. We want the people to have power, we want to arm them with complete agency and invest them with real authority; they are, after all, the rightful rulers of this country.

What is most troubling about Ms Bhutto’s posturing is the message that it sends to the world. Ms Bhutto has signaled that democracy is only possible, as the fundamentalists of the region have long believed, through an American puppet.

Since the military coup eight years ago we, writers, activists and citizens, have been wrestling against press censorship, confronting the government’s policy of disappearances, and raising our voices against violence towards women. It has not been easy.

Ms Bhutto’s promotion through the Bush White House only belittles our concerns for reform by validating the fears of the Islamists who believe we are agents of a nefarious neo-con agenda. Pakistan’s democratic future hangs in the balance. It will continue to hang uncertain for so long as demo-dictators like Gen Musharraf and Benazir Bhutto are allowed to commandeer politics to further their own ambition. And that is in no one’s interest—not the region’s, not the people’s, and not Pakistan’s.

(Fatima Bhutto is a writer. She is the daughter of Murtaza Bhutto, who was killed in 1996 in Karachi when his sister Benazir was PM)

Press TV (Iran) : Bhutto's niece slams Benazir's intent

Bhutto's niece slams Benazir's intent

MMS/MD/HAR | November 17, 2007

A Pakistani writer, Fatima Bhutto, has accused her aunt, Benazir Bhutto, of collaborating with Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf.

In a telephone conversation with Press TV on Friday, Fatima Bhutto, the daughter of Mir Murtaza Bhutto, said Bhutto thinks she is the only savior of Pakistan's democracy.

"It seems to be an undemocratic idea in and of itself, and this gives her the opportunity of surfing on the emotions of the Pakistani people to become prime minister of the country," she said.

She believes that Pakistan can establish an indigenized form of democracy that is not imposed by outside forces and Pakistani people are committed enough to the ambition. To form a true system for themselves

She said the treatment that Benazir Bhutto is receiving in Pakistan signals that she is collaborating with General Parvez Musharraf behind the scenes.

"She is allowed to move freely and speak freely. While many activists are barred for many months, Benazir Bhutto was only detained for four days," she added.

Fatima Bhutto raised the question as to why her aunt is receiving special treatment, if she was actually the 'savior of democracy in Pakistan' and if she wasn't working together with Musharraf.

AKI : Pakistan: Clash between Musharraf and Bhutto a "farce", says Bhutto niece

Pakistan: Clash between Musharraf and Bhutto a "farce", says Bhutto niece

By Marco Liconti | AKI | November 16, 2007

Karachi -- The clash between Pakistan's President Gen. Pervez Musharraf and former prime minister Benazir Bhutto during the country's current state of emergency is a "farce", according to Bhutto's niece, Fatima.

In an exclusive interview with Adnkronos International (AKI), Fatima Bhutto accused her aunt, who heads the largest opposition party, the Pakistan People's Party, of "cynicism" and wanting "to sell out the country to the United States".

Speaking by telephone from Karachi, the 25-year-old niece launched a scathing attack on the former leader and accused her of returning home to Pakistan "not to serve the interests of the people, but to chase power".

"She has certainly not returned to Pakistan to spearhead political reform," she said.

The young woman said the current crisis had degenerated into a war between two people, Musharraf and Benazir, who were losing sight of the real issues facing the country.

Bhutto said Benazir had come to an agreement with the president "because she wanted to please public opinion".

But she claimed they would both find a way to "maintain the status quo" and "extend their own respective power", excluding the only other leader with any clout, exiled former prime minister Nawaz Sharif.

As for Benazir's house arrest, revoked on Thursday, the young Bhutto described it as a joke.

"Have you ever seen anyone placed under house arrest released continually for interviews and even receive an American consul?" she said.

The young Bhutto, a poet and writer, is actively involved in politics beside her stepmother Ghinwa Bhutto, plans to stand as a candidate for the breakaway Pakistan People's Party Shaheed Bhutto (PPP-SB), which supports a return to Pakistan's liberal Constitution of 1973.

Fatima Bhutto is the daughter of the late Murtaza Bhutto, who was killed by police in 1996 in Karachi during the premiership of his sister, Benazir Bhutto. She is grand-daughter of Pakistan's former prime minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto.

During her interview with Adnkronos International, Fatima blamed her aunt for the death of her father.

"The second term of Benazir was characterised by several acts of state violence against opponents," said Bhutto.

She accused Bhutto of "creating the conditions for the violence in which he (her father) was a victim" and of also being responsible for the cover up at the inquest.

Bhutto accused of Musharraf of failing to live up to his promises while her aunt had simply given "new strength to the fundamentalists" in Pakistan.

She also called for the US alliance to be renegotiated in a way that gave Pakistan greater parity.

Fatima's mother, Ghinwa Bhutto, is the chairperson of the PPP-SB. The Lebanese widow of Murtaza Bhutto, she has staked claim to her share of the Bhutto political legacy.

HuffPo : Fatima Bhutto: Pakistanis Favor The GOP

Fatima Bhutto: Pakistanis Favor The GOP

Celsete Fremon | Celeste Fremon | November 14, 2007

OffTheBus recently caught up with Fatima Bhutto, Benazir Bhutto's niece, whose father died under questionable circumstances at the hands of the police force under her aunt's rule.

Fatima Bhutto is 25-years-old, a newspaper columnist/author and, in the eyes of many, the crown princess of Pakistan's most powerful political dynasty. She is the granddaughter of the late Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, Pakistan's wildly popular former prime minister (who was hanged after a military takeover by General Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq). Fatima is also the niece of Benazir Bhutto, the county's past and would-be future prime minister.

Aunt Benazir is back under house arrest again and calling for Musharraf to quit. Yet, when Fatima talked to me from Karachi, she had a lot to say about her aunt's extravagant political gamesmanship, about how Pakistanis will react if the U.S. attacks Iran, about which American presidential candidate looks like a winner from a Pakistani standpoint---and which Dem she personally wants to see win. [Hint: It's not Hillary].

OffTheBus: How has the Bush Administration affected Pakistani politics?

Fatima Bhutto: A lot. Musharraf has been fighting the war on terror for the Bush White House, as if it was his own, and so he's brought it to our doorstep. Prior to 9/11 and the war on terror, the religious parties in Pakistan really had no ground support. Out of 400 seats in parliament, they would take maybe four or five. They would never break double digits. But after 9/11, and after opening up our borders to American forces, and launching airstrikes, the religious right has tripled or quadrupled their support. Instead of getting four seats, they get 15 or 20 seats. And now we have a civil war going on in the northern part of our country.

OffTheBus: As you know, the US will elect a new president. Do Pakistanis pay much attention to American politics? And if so, who would they like to see in office?

FB: Actually, Pakistanis follow American elections very closely, because they affect us so much. But, if you ask most Pakistanis, they believe earnestly that Republicans are the best, because they'll give us a lot of money, aid and weapons. The average person forgets that, in return, we have to do the American's dirty work for them. I think what a lot of people are most upset about is right now is that Americans are threatening to cut aid. The average Pakistani doesn't think about what we have to do to get that money.

OffTheBus; What about you? Who do you like?

FB: I have to say I like Obama a lot. His record is the best. He's always been vocal about his opposition to the war in Iraq. And he's speaking out against the Patriot Act. Frankly, he seems very good in a lot of ways. Whereas with Hillary, if you look at her record, it doesn't support what she says now. If I could vote in the American elections, Obama would get my vote.

But even Obama has come out and said, if necessary, we will attack Pakistan. They've all said that -- Republicans and Democrats. So Pakistanis feel the safest bet is the Republicans, because they will fund us and give us those F-16s that we paid for and never got. As, for the religious parties, they like the neocons because they lose a lot of their dynamism if they have no one to go up against. For them, the neocons are perfect.

To understand the magnetic force the name "Bhutto" conjures in Pakistan, imagine the Kennedys, the Clintons and the entire Bush clan all rolled into one -- with added doses of tragedy, corruption and political intrigue. It's important to know that Fatima's father, Murtaza Bhutto, was an opposition member of parliament when older sister Benazir was last in power, and that he died in a hail of bullets under still-cloudy circumstances at the hands of the police force under his sister's rule. Then later, Benazir retreated into exile amid big-money corruption charges that Musharraf has recently agreed to drop.

You also need to know that Columbia-educated Fatima is widely expected to leap into politics herself. But, if and when she ever does, it will assuredly not be under her aunt's Pakistani People's Party banner.

OffTheBus: A lot of people have called for you to run for public office? Are you seriously considering it?

FB: Well, I don't believe my name automatically qualifies me, or makes me the best person. In a country like Pakistan where is politics is often an art form of the elite, and it's often very dynastic, it's hard to explain to people why I don't think it's a birthright. But no, I'm not going to run for elections this January or February whenever Musharraf claims its going to happen. I'd only do it if I felt I could make a positive difference. But, I feel like writing is best for now.

OffTheBus: And in the future?

FB: I'm very political in my writing. And I'm politically active in other ways. I think we can build democracy in Pakistan. But it will take time. And it will be a Pakistani democracy. Not one that's imposed by....someone else.

OffTheBus: Speaking of political impositions, how would Pakistanis react if Bush were to attack Iran?

FB: I think it would be catastrophic. If our government sides with an American attack on Iran, that'll be it. The Pakistani people have great sympathy for the Iranian people. We don't think we're anything like the Afghans. We don't think we're like the Iraqis, really either. But Pakistanis and Iranians have a connection. Urdu is very much like Farsi. It's practically the same language.

I visited Iran last January. And I asked Iranians what they would do if there was an American strike. And they said, "We'd strike America back." I asked how they could do that. And they said, "Don't you realize, we'll strike them in Afghanistan, we'll strike them in Iraq, and we'll strike them in Pakistan." Really, it would be catastrophic.

OffTheBus: Now that your aunt's again under house arrest, and has ratcheted up her calls for General Musharraf to step down, the media is reporting that the Bush-brokered power sharing deal between her and the general is now off.

FB: A lot of this is theater. Actually, it seems very much still on. Her corruption cases remain withdrawn -- as per the arrangements of the deal. all her supporters and her party members are allowed into the compound with her. She addresses her supporters outside through a megaphone. And she is granted amazing access to the media here, while other political parties have been given a blanket ban. If they want to hold a press conference they're not allowed. Only the Islamic party is given similar freedoms. And it isn't Benazir's supporters getting arrested by the thousands. It's the lawyers who have been charged with treason, and the journalists.

OffTheBus: So why her latest surge in rhetoric?

FB: I think she's in a tight spot. Her party supporters want her to come out more directly against Musharraf and she's flip flopped. It seems, though, that Musharraf's camp is tiring of her. One of his cabinet members just gave a statement saying she is the least suitable candidate for Prime Minister. But then again they never wanted her in the first place. She was forced upon them by the White House.

It's a murky situation here. Unfortunately it only gets murkier by the minute.

OffTheBus: Ever since emergency rule was declared, much of the media has been shut down. So how is everyone managing to get news?

FB: Well, this is the 13th emergency that's been declared in Pakistan's sixty-year history. So we pretty much know the drill. But the media has suffered tremendously since this emergency. The journalistic community was accused of betraying the country. A media law was passed almost immediately, which states that broadcasters can no longer give opinions about Pakistan. No live scenes of conflict can be aired on TV anymore. Now, we no longer know who is protesting, who is in danger. Stations can be shut down at any time. No foreign airtime is allowed. So we don't have CNN or the BBC anymore... And we can't even get podcasts. We're proud of the fact that we're part of the information age. Cutting that off has jolted people, especially the young people.

OffTheBus: Okay, then what methods do you use to get the word out?

FB: They haven't been able to block our email providers like Hotmail. Blogs are also very useful for notifications about protests and arrests. And we get a lot of news from text messaging. The government thought that this media blackout would deprive us of the news, but somehow we're very resourceful people.

OffTheBus: You lost your father when you were fourteen years old....

FB: Yes. He was assassinated in a very violent way. We read about assassination squads in the paper every day. Violence is so cheap in Pakistan. But when it happens to your father, you have a different stake in it. He was killed right outside our house. And I went to the hospital so I saw him in that... state. I don't know that we'll ever get justice in my father's case. Too many people have too much to lose.

OffTheBus: Were you close to your father?

FB: I was very, very close to my father. My biological mother and he were divorced when I was very young. And he didn't marry my stepmother -- who is really my mother --until years later. So my father raised me as a single parent until I was almost seven. So we were sort of bachelors in exile. It was my father who brushed my hair, and took me to school and did my homework with me. It was very progressive, I think. He was the first one to notice that I enjoyed writing. He gave me the foundation that I stand on now. He was the best.

OffTheBus: When it comes to writers, who are you heroes?

FB: Robert Fisk. I remember reading his book when I was eighteen and going off to college, and thinking, I want to be like him and be a journalist. Seymour Hersh. He's another person. My favorite poet is T.S. Elliott. I love writers from the Jazz Age. I love Fitzgerald. I'm a very proud bookworm. I just read The History of Love by Nicole Krauss. It's beautiful, beautiful writing.

OffTheBus: You're very critical of both the Musharraf government, and of your aunt. Are you ever fearful about your own safety?

FB: Well, yes... I've been very vocal in my columns, and sometimes I've been told, "You could be hurt if you're not careful." But it always comes in the form or a friendly warning and not a direct threat. (pause) But I take precautions.

Radio Australia Interviews Fatima Bhutto : PAKISTAN: Bhutto criticised for returning to Pakistan

PAKISTAN: Bhutto criticised for returning to Pakistan

October 24, 2007

Barely a week back in Pakistan, former prime minister Benazir Bhutto continues to generate controversy with her decision to return from eight years of self-imposed exile. The government is now proposing banning large rallies ahead of January's parliamentary elections, to avoid a repeat of last week's deadly suicide bombings in Karachi, which killed 139 people. To discourage similar attacks, Ms Bhutto is now proposing taking her campaign online, after being accused by opponents and even members of her family, of ignoring death threats, putting her supporters at risk. Critics include Ms Bhutto's 25-year-old niece, Fatima Bhutto. Her father is Benazir's late brother Murtaza, who was killed in 1996 amid murky circumstances that led to the collapse of Ms Bhutto's second government.

BHUTTO: What I do feel, not as a niece, what a do feel as a member of the media in Pakistan, as a member of the press and as a citizen of Karachi. I think that the whole performance of her return was very dangerous to the city and to these people and she bears responsibility for these 140 lives that have been lost.

LOPRESTI: There has been a lot of talk about that homecoming parade last Thursday and the suicide bombings that ripped through the procession. So are you saying that you believe that she is to blame for that carnage, given that she was warned?

BHUTTO: Well, I'll tell you, there was a massive campaign on behalf of the party regarding her return. The first part of that was in the television spot every half-an-hour, full-page ads in newspapers and the second part is that every party officer, every party bearer, every member of assembly from a district level through a national level was told to fill buses, to fill trucks, to fill rickshaws, to fill taxis, and bring them to Karachi for her arrival, so they could create disruption at this time. Now these 200,000 people that were bused, their transport was paid for by Benazir's party, their accommodation in Karachi was taken care of by Benazir's party and their meals were taken care of. They were here on her behalf at her invitation. And for her to come out after the fact and say I knew there was a danger of a suicide bombing and I was warned that an attack would take place - well, it's very irresponsible of her to place all these peoples' lives at risk, while she herself was very protected. She had a bulletproof car and she spoke behind fortified steel containers, but these people were out in the open.

LOPRESTI: Do you think she's an opportunist?

BHUTTO: Politically, Benazir is a machine that thrives on the fear of victimisation. The chaos that follows this kind of violence has always proved very, very convenient for her and she's always trying to portray herself as a prime minister wrongly accused on corruption charges, a former leader in exile. And that's what's she doing now as well, is that she's saying this attack was an attack on democracy. Absolutely not. We have been fighting for democracy for the last eight years, while she was in exile. This attack was not an attack on democracy, it was an attack on her.

LOPRESTI: Well, if I could just take up that point that you make about democracy in Pakistan. I mean she is able to return to Pakistan after General Musharraf dropped the corruption charges against her. In return, he has an ally and has secured his position for now. Given that she has effectively bailed President Musharraf out, because he was sinking politically and was on the verge of declaring a state of emergency, has she - in your view - derailed the democratic political process?

BHUTTO: Yes, absolutely. I'll tell you why. First of all, the deal under which she came back, the terms that were set, including Musharraf dropping her corruption charges, I mean this has proved very dangerous for this country, because first of all, not only will it wipe out 20 years' worth of corruption charges and violence from various politicians, bureaucrats and bankers, but it also includes a provision that will make it virtually impossible for citizens of this country to file charges against a sitting parliamentarian. These are very dangerous precedents first of all. And then secondly, Benazir's return and this violence that followed her has now led people to say well, we had been planning for elections for January 2008, but in light of this silence, maybe public rallies should be banned.

LOPRESTI: And she is saying she's suggesting to hold virtual rallies and campaign by telephone?

BHUTTO: Well, you know what, unfortunately for Ms Bhutto we live in a very poor country, we live in a developing country and the majority of our citizens do not have access to the internet, the majority of our citizens are illiterate, so how does she propose to embark on an internet campaign. That's ridiculous and it shows how out of touch she is with the political reality in Pakistan.

LOPRESTI: Do you think that Benazir Bhutto is also making herself a target for assassination, given that she is siding with the president, who is hugely unpopular in Pakistan and viewed as a stooge for the Americans?

BHUTTO: It's not allying herself with Musharraf that has caused this violence. The reason that there is a danger towards her life is because she's allied herself to neoconservatives in the Bush White House. For example before her return, she gave statements saying that once elected prime minister for the third time, which she assumes is going to be a given, she would then allow America to come in and hunt for Osama in Pakistan proper and bring the war to our cities, to Karachi, to Islamabad, to Lahore. Now this dug very sharply amongst Pakistanis for someone to come in and say almost giddily that they would allow American troops within our country. This is a great betrayal.

LOPRESTI: Are these the reasons why you've been quoted as saying I'm scared for what this means for the country, meaning her return. Is it repulsive?

BHUTTO: Absolutely, I mean first of all the ordinance that she's come back under is unbelievable. I mean it actively disempowers the people. Benazir herself is accused of taking an estimated amount of $US2.5 billion out of this country, and that's one person and to just give the general amnesty and wipe the slate clean, that is a very dangerous precedent for this country. And her alliance with the pro-neocon agenda is very frightening for us, because her advancement to power through the Bush White House and through these statements comes at the cost of our lives.

Electric New Paper (Singapore) : Bhutto vs Bhutto: Niece blames aunt for Pakistan suicide bomb deaths

Bhutto vs Bhutto: Niece blames aunt for Pakistan suicide bomb deaths

'They died for Benazir's grand show'

October 24, 2007

YOU caused their deaths.

That's what Ms Fatima Bhutto, said of her aunt Benazir Bhutto after 139 people died in suicide bombings at Ms Benazir's homecoming parade in Karachi last week.

Ms Fatima, a 25-year-old poet and newspaper columnist, said the former Pakistan prime minister had endangered the victims for the sake of personal theatre.

Said Ms Fatima at her plush Karachi home: 'She insisted on this grand show, she bears a responsibility for these deaths and for these injuries.'

She accused her aunt of protecting herself with an armoured truck, while bringing in hundreds of thousands of supporters by bus, despite warnings of an attack.

'They died for this personal theatre of hers, they died for this personal show,' she said.

Ms Fatima is the daughter of MsBenazir's late brother, Murtaza, who was killed by police in Karachi in 1996 amid murky circumstances that led to the collapse of Benazir's second term in government.

Mr Murtaza led a left-wing extremist group after military ruler Zia-ul-Haq executed Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto in 1979 and then fell out with his sister over what he felt was her betrayal of their father's political legacy.

Ms Benazir has blamed Islamic extremists, possibly with links to rogue or former intelligence agents, for the attack.

Her Pakistan People's Party (PPP) dismissed Ms Fatima's accusation as 'senseless'.

Reacting to the comments made by Ms Benazir's enstranged niece, Ms Benazir's key aide, fellow PPP leader Sherry Rehman has angrily retorted to Fatima's comments dismissing them as 'inappropriate'.

SHE'S EMOTIONAL

She told a private television channel: 'Fatima Bhutto is young and emotional, she does not even know what she is saying and is also unaware of the reality and politics of the country.

'Benazir Bhutto had come to Pakistan with a message of peace, and it is inappropriate for Fatima to give such a statement against her family.'

Authorities are questioning three people from the south of Punjab province over the attack.

Meanwhile, the PPP has also vowed to defy a planned ban on political rallies in the run-up to general elections. It is seen as a key step to restoring civilian rule here.

The government says it is drawing up a code of conduct for campaigning that would ban large rallies amid fears of further deadly attacks by militants. It will allow only 'small corner meetings' with tight security.

But the PPP has slammed the ban as outrageous amid fears of a crackdown on campaigning.

Ms Benazir has pledged to remain in Pakistan to lead the PPP in the elections set for early January despite the bombings that shattered what she hoped would be her triumphant return to Pakistan after eight years in self-imposed exile.

AFP : Bhutto must take responsibility for blast deaths: niece

Bhutto must take responsibility for blast deaths: niece

October 21, 2007

KARACHI (AFP) — Benazir Bhutto bears the responsibility for the deaths of 139 people in an attack on her homecoming parade by exposing them to danger for the sake of her own "personal theatre", her estranged niece said.

Newspaper columnist and poet Fatima Bhutto, the granddaughter of late Pakistani premier Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, also told AFP in an interview that her aunt's return from exile would plunge the country further into turmoil.

"She insisted on this grand show, she bears a responsibility for these deaths and for these injuries," the 25-year-old said at her plush family home in Karachi two days after the bombings.

Fatima Bhutto is the daughter of former prime minister Benazir's late brother Murtaza, who was killed by police in Karachi in 1996 amid murky circumstances that led to the collapse of her second term in government.

Murtaza led a left-wing extremist group after military ruler Zia-ul-Haq executed Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto in 1979 and then fell out with his sister over what he felt was her betrayal of their father's political legacy.

Murtaza's daughter, often heralded in the Pakistani media as an inheritor of the dynasty's heavy crown and bears a family resemblance to Benazir Bhutto, has recently launched a series of salvos against her aunt.

In the latest Fatima Bhutto accused the opposition leader of protecting herself on her return to Pakistan with an armoured truck, while bussing in hundreds of thousands of supporters despite warnings of an attack.

"They died for this personal theatre of hers, they died for this personal show," she said.

The suicide and grenade blast happened hours after Benazir Bhutto, a two-time premier, flew to Karachi from Dubai. She has blamed Islamic extremists, possibly with links to rogue or former intelligence agents, for the attack.

Her Pakistan People's Party dismissed "senseless accusations" that the 54-year-old was responsible for the deaths, saying it was the government's job to protect its citizens.

"Those who have died, their families are proud of them. The attack was against Benazir Bhutto. All those including ourselves who went there took the risk knowingly," senior party leader Taj Haider said.

Speaking in a sitting room decked with oil paintings of her grandfather, father and other family members -- although not her aunt -- Fatima Bhutto also said her aunt was not the enemy of militancy that she claims to be.

Benazir Bhutto's return to Pakistan was heavily backed by the United States, which sees the Islamic world's first female premier as a potential partner for President Pervez Musharraf, a key US ally in the "war on terror".

"She talks about extremism and nobody else points out that the Taliban was created under her last government," Fatima Bhutto said, referring to the hardline Taliban regime that ruled Afghanistan from 1996 until 2001.

Fatima, educated like her aunt at universities in the United States and Britain, meanwhile condemned the amnesty on corruption charges given to Benazir Bhutto by Musharraf that enabled her to return to the country.

"What this (amnesty) means for this country is very, very frightening," she said.

The younger Bhutto, whose house in the city's seaside Clifton neighbourhood is next door to her grandfather's home, said however that she was not likely to enter Pakistan's turbulent politics any time soon.

She said her newspaper column, which often focuses on political and rights issues, was itself a "political act."

"But as for running for elections, just because I have this last name, I don't think I am entitled to it. I don't think it is a birthright," she said.

"I can't rule anything out for the future, but I think there are a lot of other ways to be political and right now I am choosing this way."

Times of India : Bhutto must take responsibility for blast deaths: Niece

Bhutto must take responsibility for blast deaths: Niece

October 21, 2007

KARACHI: Benazir Bhutto bears the responsibility for the deaths of 139 people in an attack on her homecoming parade by exposing them to danger for the sake of her own "personal theatre", her estranged niece said.

Newspaper columnist and poet Fatima Bhutto, the granddaughter of late Pakistani premier Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, also said in an interview that her aunt's return from exile would plunge the country further into turmoil.

"She insisted on this grand show, she bears a responsibility for these deaths and for these injuries," the 25-year-old said at her plush family home in Karachi two days after the bombings.

Fatima Bhutto is the daughter of former prime minister Benazir's late brother Murtaza, who was killed by police in Karachi in 1996 amid murky circumstances that led to the collapse of her second term in government.

Murtaza led a left-wing extremist group after military ruler Zia-ul-Haq executed Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto in 1979 and then fell out with his sister over what he felt was her betrayal of their father's political legacy.

Murtaza's daughter, often heralded in the Pakistani media as an inheritor of the dynasty's heavy crown and bears a family resemblance to Benazir Bhutto, has recently launched a series of salvos against her aunt.

In the latest Fatima Bhutto accused the opposition leader of protecting herself on her return to Pakistan with an armoured truck, while bussing in hundreds of thousands of supporters despite warnings of an attack.

"They died for this personal theatre of hers, they died for this personal show," she said.

The suicide and grenade blast happened hours after Benazir Bhutto, a two-time premier, flew to Karachi from Dubai. She has blamed Islamic extremists, possibly with links to rogue or former intelligence agents, for the attack.

Her Pakistan People's Party dismissed "senseless accusations" that the 54-year-old was responsible for the deaths, saying it was the government's job to protect its citizens.

"Those who have died, their families are proud of them. The attack was against Benazir Bhutto. All those including ourselves who went there took the risk knowingly," senior party leader Taj Haider said.

Speaking in a sitting room decked with oil paintings of her grandfather, father and other family members -- although not her aunt -- Fatima Bhutto also said her aunt was not the enemy of militancy that she claims to be.

Benazir Bhutto's return to Pakistan was heavily backed by the United States, which sees the Islamic world's first female premier as a potential partner for President Pervez Musharraf, a key US ally in the "war on terror".

"She talks about extremism and nobody else points out that the Taliban was created under her last government," Fatima Bhutto said, referring to the hardline Taliban regime that ruled Afghanistan from 1996 until 2001.

Fatima, educated like her aunt at universities in the United States and Britain, meanwhile condemned the amnesty on corruption charges given to Benazir Bhutto by Musharraf that enabled her to return to the country.

"What this (amnesty) means for this country is very, very frightening," she said.

The younger Bhutto, whose house in the city's seaside Clifton neighbourhood is next door to her grandfather's home, said however that she was not likely to enter Pakistan's turbulent politics any time soon.

She said her newspaper column, which often focuses on political and rights issues, was itself a "political act."

"But as for running for elections, just because I have this last name, I don't think I am entitled to it. I don't think it is a birthright," she said.

"I can't rule anything out for the future, but I think there are a lot of other ways to be political and right now I am choosing this way."