British detectives inspect Benazir martyrdom scene

British anti-terrorism police on Saturday started examining evidence in the martyrdom of Benazir Bhutto, officials said.

Armed commandos enforced a security cordon as Scotland Yard detectives made their first inspection of the Liaqat Bagh public park where Benazir was martyred as she left a campaign rally on December 27, an AFP photographer witnessed.

The arrival of the five-man British squad on Friday has only deepened the conspiracy theories swirling around the gun and suicide attack on Benazir, which sparked violent unrest across country and set vital elections back six weeks.

“The Scotland Yard team is examining the venue where she addressed a rally and the site where she was attacked,” a Rawalpindi police official told AFP on Saturday.

Pakistan’s interior ministry has blamed the attack on an alleged al Qaeda militant and says Benazir martyred from an accidental head wound sustained as she ducked for cover as a gunman opened fire on her motorcade.

But party aides who were by her side at the time say she died from a gunshot to the head. Her husband, Asif Ali Zardari, refused to allow an autopsy before she was buried, saying “we know how she died.”

The PPP has demanded a UN probe into Benazir’s martyrdom similar to the one into the murder of former Lebanese prime minister Rafiq Hariri in 2005, but the government has ruled out such an investigation.