C.I.A. Sees Qaeda Link in the Death of Bhutto

WASHINGTON, Jan 19th. (NY Times) — The Central Intelligence Agency has concluded that the assassins of Benazir Bhutto, the former Pakistani prime minister, were directed by Baitullah Mehsud, a Pakistani militant leader in hiding, and that some of them had ties to Al Qaeda. The C.I.A.’s judgment is the first formal assessment by the American government about who was responsible for Ms. Bhutto’s Dec. 27 assassination, which took place during a political rally in the garrison city of Rawalpindi. “There are powerful reasons to believe that terror networks around Baitullah Mehsud were responsible,” said one American intelligence official, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak publicly on the matter. The official said that “different pieces of information” had pointed toward Mr. Mehsud’s responsibility, but he would not provide any details.

Gen. Michael V. Hayden, the C.I.A. director, discussed the agency’s conclusion in an interview with The Washington Post published Friday. Some friends and supporters of Ms. Bhutto questioned the C.I.A. conclusions, especially since the former leader was buried before a full forensic investigation had been conducted. The British government has since sent a team from Scotland Yard to participate in the investigation into the assassination. “The C.I.A. appears too eager to bail out its liaison services in Pakistan, who are being blamed by most Pakistanis,” said Husain Haqqani, a former adviser to Ms. Bhutto and a professor at Boston University. “Given the division inside Pakistan on this issue, it might be better to have an international investigation under the aegis of the U.N.,” Mr. Haqqani said.

Within days of Ms. Bhutto’s assassination, Pakistani authorities announced they had intercepted communications between Mr. Mehsud and militant supporters in which they said the leader had congratulated his followers for the assassination and appeared to take responsibility for it. Mr. Mehsud, through a spokesman, has denied responsibility for the killing and suggested that the assassins were directed by Pervez Musharraf, Pakistan’s president and a longtime rival of Ms. Bhutto’s. Members of Ms. Bhutto’s political party, along with some of her family members, have also challenged Pakistani government accounts of the attack. They have blamed Mr. Musharraf for failing to provide Ms. Bhutto with adequate protection as she campaigned around the country, and some have hinted that elements of Pakistan’s government may have been behind the assassination.

American and Pakistani officials have blamed Mr. Mehsud’s followers for many recent suicide attacks against government, military and intelligence targets in Pakistan. Based in the South Waziristan tribal areas along the Pakistan-Afghanistan border, Mr. Mehsud runs training camps and dispatches suicide bombers beyond the border areas in both countries, the officials say. He is also believed to have links to the Arab and Central Asian militants who have established a stronghold in the tribal areas. Government officials in Pakistan and independent security analysts say they believe that the Qaeda network in Pakistan is increasingly made up of homegrown militants who have made destabilizing the government a top priority. American intelligence officials say they believe that Al Qaeda has steadily built a safe haven in the mountainous tribal areas of western Pakistan, constructing a band of makeshift compounds where both Pakistani militants and foreign fighters conduct training and planning for terrorist attacks. This has led to mounting frustration among intelligence and counterterrorism officials, many of whom believe that the United States should take more aggressive unilateral steps to dismantle terrorist networks in the tribal areas. The Bush administration is currently considering proposals to step up covert actions in Pakistan against the Qaeda network.
By MARK MAZZETTI
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