You have commented 339 times on Rantburg.

Your Name
Your e-mail (optional)
Website (optional)
My Original Nic        Pic-a-Nic        Sorry. Comments have been closed on this article.
Bold Italic Underline Strike Bullet Blockquote Small Big Link Squish Foto Photo
India-Pakistan
Baitullah dunnit
2007-12-29
Bill Roggio sez Interior Ministry spokesman Iqbal Cheema released this. No telling how authentic. But note that they know where Baitullah is in his own words and haven't done anything to zap him. Anwar Shah's "house," I'm told, is more like a medieval manor house. Or a fortress.
Maulvi Sahib (MS): Chief, how are you?
Baitullah Mehsud (BM): I am fine.
MS: Congratulations, I just got back during the night.
BM: Congratulations to you, were they our men?
MS: Yes they were ours.
BM: Who were they?
MS: There was Saeed, there was Bilal from Badar and Ikramullah.
BM: The three of them did it?
MS: Ikramullah and Bilal did it.
BM: Then congratulations.
MS: Where are you? I want to meet you.
BM: I am at Makeen (town in South Waziristan tribal region), come over, I am at Anwar Shah's house.
MS: OK, I'll come.
BM: Don't inform their house for the time being.
MS: OK.
BM: It was a tremendous effort. They were really brave boys who killed her.
MS: Mashallah (Thank God). When I come I will give you all the details.
BM: I will wait for you. Congratulations, once again congratulations.
MS: Congratulations to you.
Posted by:Fred

#24  You can clearly see the shooter firing the pistol 3 times from BB rear left in this video

http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=6be_1198938194
Posted by: Woozle Uneath8763   2007-12-29 16:20  

#23  Looks like I was right about a seperate shooter and boomer. And it looks like the shooter got away.
Posted by: phil_b   2007-12-29 16:05  

#22  Steve, that makes sense.
Posted by: KBK   2007-12-29 14:23  

#21  This whole thing is starting to smell like the Benino Aquino murder under Marcos.
Posted by: Gabby Cussworth   2007-12-29 13:19  

#20  Those are not X-ray images.

The first might be a photocopy of an X-ray. The second might be a photograph (with flash reflection) of a photocopy of a photocopy of a photocopy of an X-ray.

But neither of those are X-rays. That simple.
Posted by: Steve White   2007-12-29 12:47  

#19  I believe the 2nd photo is of Nancy Pelosi's brain and it's inner workings.
Posted by: Slappy   2007-12-29 12:33  

#18  Those images are like no xray I've ever seen, especially the second one.

She could have been shot in the head and whacked by the handle as she dropped, possibly assisted by the subsequent explosion. If she was shot in the abdomen, then there should be at least one bullet hole in the vehicle. Or shrapnel penetration.
Posted by: KBK   2007-12-29 12:03  

#17  Joe's fine, although there *was* an eggnog incident over Christmas...
Posted by: Seafarious   2007-12-29 11:37  

#16  Our beloved JosephM is safely on Guam, Jack. He posted today on some of the other threads. Oh, and welcome home!
Posted by: trailing wife   2007-12-29 11:29  

#15  Up to and including the manufacturer of the door handle.

Posted by: Seafarious   2007-12-29 11:27  

#14  Who knows who did it?
I'd take no chances and shoot everybody...
Posted by: tu3031   2007-12-29 11:12  

#13  The plot thickens, talibunnies in denial, further 'evidence' of skull fracture (even after the shooter video has been released). Curiouser and curioser....
Posted by: Tony (UK)   2007-12-29 10:23  

#12  Been on travel. What happened to Joe Mendiola?

Is he in Pakistan?
Posted by: Jack is Back!   2007-12-29 09:06  

#11  I vote RD as most likely successor to Joseph Mendiola.

Damn. And I've tried, and failed, to imitiate Army Man's KCNA dispatces without success. Meh, some guys are unreplaceable.
Posted by: Ptah   2007-12-29 08:11  

#10  In a new twist to the killing of former premier Benazir Bhutto, the Taliban commander blamed by the Pakistan government for masterminding the assassination on Saturday denied any involvement in the attack.

Maulvi Muhammad Omar, a spokesman for Pakistani Taliban commander Baitullah Mehsud, told reporters in Peshawar on phone from an undisclosed location that the government was trying to implicate Mehsud to cover up its "failure" to provide security to Bhutto.

"We are sad over Benazir Bhutto's death. We do not have any enmity with Pakistani leaders and are only opposed to the US," Omar said and described the government's claims about Mehsud's involvement in the suicide attack as "propaganda".

Mehsud was recently chosen as chief of the Tehrik Taliban-e-Pakistan, a coalition of pro-Taliban groups from Pakistan's northwestern tribal areas.

Maulvi Omar said it was against tribal culture and traditions to attack a woman.

Omar also said a transcript released by the interior ministry of a purported conversation in which Mehsud apparently congratulated another person for the attack on Bhutto was "fabricated".

"Mehsud never congratulated anyone for the killing of Benazir Bhutto," he said
Posted by: john frum   2007-12-29 07:24  

#9  






Posted by: john frum   2007-12-29 07:14  

#8  top aide who helped bathe Benazir Bhutto's body after her death said it was clear that the former Pakistani prime minister suffered bullet wounds to her head, contrary to a government report that she died because she hit her head on a sunroof lever.

Pakistan People's Party information secretary Sherry Rehman, who was riding in the car behind Benazir's when it was attacked, called the government's conclusion that Benazir was not shot "the most bizarre, dangerous nonsense."

"It's beginning to look like a cover up to me," Rehman said in a CNN interview.

Rehman said Benazir was hemorrhaging on the way to the hospital and that the two cars used to get her there were blood-soaked.

"There were clear bullet injuries to her head," said Rehman. "When we bathed her we saw that."
Posted by: john frum   2007-12-29 07:12  

#7  A top aide to slain opposition leader Benazir Bhutto on Friday rejected the governmentÂ’s explanation of her death as a “pack of lies”.

The Pakistan interior ministry said Ms Bhutto died when she hit her head on her vehicleÂ’s sunroof as she ducked after a gun and suicide attack on a campaign rally, and that no bullets or shrapnel were found in her.

“It is baseless. It is a pack of lies,” Farooq Naik, Ms Bhutto’s top lawyer and a senior official in her Pakistan People’s Party, told AFP.

“Two bullets hit her, one in the abdomen and one in the head,” Mr Naik said. “Bhutto’s personal secretary Naheed Khan and party official Makhdoom Amin Fahim were in the car and they saw what happened,” he said.

“It is an irreparable loss and they are turning it into a joke with such claims. The country is heading towards civil war.” Interior ministry spokesman Javed Cheema said earlier that the post-mortem on the populist opposition leader found her mortal wound came when she tried to duck after the bomber attacked.

“The government is now claiming that Baitullah Mehsud is responsible,” Mr Naik told AFP. “What is the evidence?”

He added: “She was taken to hospital. She was bleeding. It was a serious security lapse.”—AFP
Posted by: john frum   2007-12-29 06:56  

#6  I wonder if they also have the local fire department hose down the radio intercept tapes....
Posted by: john frum   2007-12-29 06:42  

#5  olde Climatic Camelot Crumble
Damn, Go dawg go!
Posted by: Thomas Woof   2007-12-29 06:18  

#4  Baitullah dunnit

PLUS EXTRA, *Secretes*

Boyz and Girlz, the Olde Commies still hanging on inside the [Striking] HollyWeird Writers A$$ociation are so Damn Desperate for sum Agit-Prop work, that they've Rented Out Their #2 Pencils to the ISI and sold them dressed up portions of the olde Climatic Camelot Crumble to fit poor Benazir Bhutto's recent untimely ending.
Posted by: RD   2007-12-29 02:17  

#3  They didn't once mention eggplant.
Posted by: Seafarious   2007-12-29 01:28  

#2  Does seem to suggest a certain efficiency that heretofore has been lacking in that country ...
Posted by: Steve White   2007-12-29 01:18  

#1  ...I call bullsh*t. Awfully convienient that they pick up this call almost immediately.

Mike
Posted by: Mike Kozlowski   2007-12-29 00:04  

00:00