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PAKISTAN: Bhutto's Sudden, Shabby End

A secret execution inspires revulsion and protest

"If I am assassinated on the gallows, there will be turmoil and turbulence, conflict and conflagration."

—A death-cell prediction by former Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto

The sputter of midnight traffic had given way to the long wait for dawn when the 1,400 inmates of Rawalpindi District Jail began to pray. Imperceptibly at first, their murmur grew as they recited from the Koran; the time for execution was approaching. Shortly before 2 a.m., the prisoner, gaunt and ailing, was led from his dungeon death cell to the scaffolding. His hands were tied behind his back. Stepping...

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