Pakistan blames Bhutto killing on Qaeda, Taliban

Benazir buried as crisis erupts

ISLAMABAD (Agencies)

Pakistan has "intelligence intercepts" indicating that al-Qaeda and Taliban were behind the killing of opposition leader Benazir Bhutto and another key opposition leader Nawaz Sharif is also under threat of militant attack, the Interior Ministry said on Friday.

"We have intelligence intercepts indicating that al-Qaeda leader Baitullah Mehsud is behind her assassination," ministry spokesman Javed Iqbal Cheema told a news conference.

Mehsud is one of Pakistan's most wanted militant leaders and is based in the South Waziristan region on the Afghan border.

Cheema said authorities had recorded an intercept on Friday morning in which Mehsud had congratulated his people for carrying out the attack.

He also said Mehsud was behind a suicide bomb attack on Bhutto in Karachi that killed about 140 people hours after she arrived back in the country from eight years of exile in October.

Cheema added that Bhutto had not been shot, nor had she been hit by shrapnel from the blast but she had been killed when the force of the explosion crashed her head against a lever on the sun-roof of her vehicle.

Three shots were fired and the blast then went off as Bhutto was ducking back inside the car. The impact of her head on the sun-roof lever fractured her skull and killed her, he said.

"There was no bullet that hit her .... there was no splinter that hit her," Cheema said.

Meanwhile, Bhutto was buried Friday at her family's mausoleum in the southern province of Sindh, state television said.

Bhutto's husband, Asif Ali Zardari, accompanied the closed coffin draped with the green, red and black tricolor of her Pakistan People's Party as it began the 7-km (4-mile) journey by ambulance to the white mausoleum.

"Show patience. Give us courage to bear this loss," Zardari earlier told the crowds after arriving in Sindh with his wife's body, accompanied by their three teenage children.

Security was tight with thousands of party members and supporters gathered to say goodbye to the slain leader.

Mourners wept and beat their heads as Bhutto's body was carried out of her ancestral home in Sindh, at the start of the funeral procession.

Musharraf blamed

Bhutto looks on at her last rally before her assassination

Many of Bhutto's supporters blamed Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf for her death, along with the United States which has backed the former army general, dismissing speculation that she had been killed by al Qaeda.

Grief-stricken supporters burned vehicles and buildings, blocked roads and screamed abuse at Musharraf as anger over her death triggered violence that has left at least 30 people dead, with numbers continuously rising.

Chants of "Shame on the killer Musharraf, shame on the killer U.S." were heard from the throng lining the road and standing on rooftops during her funeral procession.

"No matter how many Bhuttos you will kill, a Bhutto will emerge from each house," others cried.

"We're anticipating the situation might get worse after the funeral," Sindh Interior Minister Akhtar Zaman said.

Authorities issued an order to shoot violent protesters on sight.

Meanwhile, a blast at an election meeting in Pakistan's troubled northwest killed six people including a candidate for the party that supports Musharraf, police said.

Bhutto was an outspoken critic of Al-Qaeda-linked Islamic extremists blamed for scores of bombings in Pakistan, and she had received death threats from militant groups.

She had also accused elements from the intelligence services of involvement in a suicide attack on her convoy in Karachi on October 18 as she returned from exile. She narrowly escaped, but the attack left 139 people dead.

Her father Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, who was also prime minister and founded the Pakistan People's Party that she took over, was executed by the military in 1979 after being ousted from power.

World condemns killing

World leaders roundly condemned what neighbor India called an "abominable act." United Nations chief Ban Ki-moon described it as a "heinous crime," and the U.N. Security Council condemned the "terrorist suicide attack" after meeting in emergency session.

Her death has stunned the world as leaders urged calm and warned that extremists must not be allowed to destabilize the nuclear-armed nation before the vote.

U.S. President George W. Bush described the killing as a "cowardly act" and telephoned Musharraf -- a crucial ally in the U.S.-led "war on terror" against Islamic extremism -- to urge Pakistan to stay on the path of democracy.

Musharraf, for his part, urged people to remain peaceful "so that the evil designs of terrorists can be defeated." All schools, businesses and banks were ordered to close down.