Bhutto's Assassination

My comments sent to www.cnn.com/yourviews

The unthinkable has happened in Pakistan. I just sat in disbelief while I watched the pictures showing the horror unfolding again and again. There is no doubt in my mind that this could not have happened without support from elements inside Pakistan's security establishment. These elements would be more than happy to see her gone or effectively removed from the political scene. The shooter cum bomber could have come from Al-Qaeda or Taliban but this could not have happened without a security lapse on the part of the Government. The military regime in Pakistan wastes no time in spying on its on citizens, arresting them, torturing them yet it cannot provide security to a woman who was elected twice as our prime minister.

This is going to be explosive. Already, Bhutto's party workers are out on the street taking out their anger on everything remotely connected to Musharraf and his regime. This will strengthen the hands of separatists or secessionists movements in Sindh and Balochistan and weaken the federation. Honestly, killing Musharraf would have less volatile or explosive. I can't express my shock and horror at what might be lying in store for my country.

The US policy of cultivating a relationship with the military in Pakistan and not its people will come to haunt them now. Musharraf is one of their biggest foreign policy failure. In the name of establishing democracy they pressed a leader of the people to accommodate a dictator! For whose benefit, I want to ask. Pakistanis, Musharraf or George Bush. US administration needs to understand that they must stop supporting dictators in Pakistan in general and rest of the world in particular. Let the people in each land decide, let them choose their destiny. Let them have democracy as they deem it fit. Not how George Bush sees it sitting in the White House or Musharraf felt about it all along in his military uniform.