Murtaza Bhutto

On 3 December 2009, a sessions court in Karachi acquitted of murder twenty policemen in the Murtaza Bhutto case pertaining to an armed attack on a police team in which two officials were wounded and a taxi driver was also killed. The same court also pardoned six workers of the Pakistan People's Party Shaheed Bhutto in the same case.

In 2003 the case against Murtaza Bhutto and his brother was concluded quietly absolving them from blame relating to the PIA Hijacking, according to Fatima Bhutto's Book – Songs of Blood and Sword. In the book, she indicates that the actual leader of the hijacking was Salamullah Tipu. Tipu had attempted to join the AZO in Kabul, but was rejected as the AZO supposedly never accepted those that came to them (in what was to be a futile effort to prevent infiltration). Murtaza Bhutto was supposedly only to hear about the hijacking when Tipu called him in Afghanistan from the hijacked aircraft.

He returned to Pakistan in 1993 and was arrested for terrorism on the orders of his sister, then-Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto. Released on bail, Murtaza successfully contested elections to the Sindh Provincial Assembly, becoming a vocal critic of Benazir and her husband Asif Ali Zardari. After increasing tensions between the two, he was shot dead along with six associates in a police encounter near his home in Karachi on 20 September 1996. Benazir's government was dismissed a month later by President Farooq Leghari primarily citing Murtaza's death and corruption. Zardari was arrested and indicted for Murtaza's murder, but acquitted in 2008. Murtaza's own faction of his father's Pakistan People's Party, Shaheed Bhutto, remains active in politics.

After returning to Pakistan from exile , Bhutto offered his sister, Benazir Bhutto, the chance to revive the manifesto of PPP which his father championed. However, he was not happy with the ways of Benazir's husband Asif Ali Zardari and wanted him removed from influence in the PPP. When Benazir decided to side with her husband, Murtaza became a strong critic of the PPP government and the ongoing corruption. It is widely believed in Pakistan that this incident drove Zardari to rage and he used police machinery to assassinate Murtaza Bhutto. Benazir became highly unpopular after this incident and her limo was stoned by PPP workers when she tried to visit Murtaza's funeral ceremonies. After Benazir's government was dismissed in 1996, Zardari was detained for having a part in Murtaza's assassination. However, no charges were ever proven due to lack of evidence.

On Thursday, 20 September 1996 at 6:35 p.m., Bhutto, along with six other party activists, was killed in an encounter with police near his residence. Among the dead was Aashiq Jatoi, the acting provincial chief of the Pakistan Peoples Party (Shaheed Bhutto Group). Jatoi was a brother in-law of Ghulam Mustafa Jatoi, the former Prime Minister of Pakistan. The injured list included six activists of Murtaza Bhutto's party and three policemen, including Superintendent of Police of Saddar area of Karachi and two other station house officers (SHOs).

Police said Bhutto's followers, who were in three cars returning from a party, fired first when asked to stop. Police returned fire, killing six people, all members of Murtaza Bhutto's faction. This was confirmed by the Deputy Inspector General of police Shoaib Suddle. Suddle further said that the police had insisted on checking the vehicles because of tightened security after two bomb blasts in Karachi on Wednesday, 18 September 1996, in which one person was killed and at least four others were wounded. The party activists who were wounded were identified as Dr. Mazhar Memon, Siraj Hyder, Ismail, Ayaz, Asghar and Bachhal. The policemen who were shot were ASP Saddar Shahid Hayat, SHO Clifton Haq Nawaz Sayyal, and SHO Napier Junaid. Two injured policemen remained unidentified. The injured were moved to the Aga Khan Hospital and Civil Hospital. Those who were killed with Bhutto were identified as Ashiq Jatoi, Rehman Brohi, Sajjad Hyder, Abdul Sattar Rajpur, Yar Mohammed Baloch and Wajahat Jokhio. The bodies reached JPMC Hospital at about 3:30 a.m. The police arrested 12 supporters of Bhutto and seized about a dozen AK-47 rifles from their possession.

Al-Zulfiqar hijacked a Pakistan International Airlines flight after and diverted it to Kabul in March 1981. From Kabul the journey went on to Damascus, Syria. The hijacking went on for thirteen days, during which Murtaza shot Major Tariq Rahim for being an Army officer. Rahim was executed following Murtaza's conferring with Afghan Intelligence (KHAD) chief Mohammad Najibullah. The Zia government had to accept the demands of the hijackers, releasing dozens of prisoners languishing in Pakistani jails and flying them to Tripoli.

Like his elder sister, Benazir, Murtaza Bhutto was a novice to active politics until 1978 when his father, Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, was sentenced to death by the Lahore High Court. In the span of 15 years, however, Murtaza managed to gain considerable notoriety for a brand of politics that has moved in a direction that was diametrically opposed to Benazir's. Al-Zulfiqar was a leftist insurgency and militant organisation of Pakistan. It was formed in the late seventies by the sons of former Pakistani Prime Minister, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, who was also the Chairman of Pakistan's biggest political party, the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP). Al-Zulfiqar was formed to avenge the execution of Ali Bhutto by the right-wing military regime of General Mohammad Zia-ul-Haq in 1976. Zia had deposed the populist Bhutto regime in a military coup in July 1977. Bhutto was hanged by the Zia regime after a closed military trial. Ali Bhutto's two sons, Murtaza and Shahnawaz went into exile in Afghanistan which was at that time controlled by communist revolutionary government of Babrak Karmal. There the two sons formed Al-Zulfiqar along with hundreds of Pakistan Peoples Party militants who had escaped Zia's persecution. The Al-Zulfiqar Organization (AZO) was born at this point, and disgruntled elements among the younger members of the PPP, disappointed in the party's leadership, flocked to Murtaza's side. The AZO, however, went on to earn the title of terrorist organisation due to its various terrorist activities throughout the country, a label which dogged Murtaza till he died. For his part, Murtaza always denied the charge that he espoused the politics of terrorism.

Murtaza had been in Pakistan until Zulfikar Ali Bhutto's government was overthrown on 5  July 1977. Along with other family members, Murtaza had returned to Al-Murtaza, Larkana, and at the time was busy helping in the preparations for the elections scheduled for October 1977. But on 16 September 1977 when Ali Bhutto was arrested at Al-Murtaza, he asked his son to leave the country. After Ali Bhutto was sentenced, Murtaza joined hands with his brother, Shahnawaz Bhutto, to initiate a campaign to muster international support to revoke the death penalty looming over his father's head. Leaders from Syria, Libya, and the PLO were particularly supportive. Mercy appeals were sent by several heads of state to General Zia-ul-Haq; however, all these appeals were disregarded and Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto was executed. Murtaza and Shahnawaz both cut short their respective courses of study and decided to devote themselves to avenge their father's death. Eventually they resorted to taking up arms, their main target being Zia-ul-Haq. This marked the beginning of a new and more controversial era in Murtaza's life.

Mir Ghulam Murtaza Bhutto (18 September 1954 – 20 September 1996) was a Pakistani politician. He was the son of former Pakistani Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto and his Iranian Kurdish wife Nusrat. He started the militant organization Al-Zulfiqar after his father was overthrown and executed in 1979 by General Zia-ul-Haq. He moved to Afghanistan as a fugitive and was sentenced to death in absentia by a military tribunal.

Born in Karachi on 18 September 1954, Bhutto received his early education at St. Mary's Academy. He later passed his 'O' levels from the Karachi Grammar School in 1971. In 1972, Murtaza went off to Harvard University where he took his bachelor's degree. For a period of time, he was the roommate of Texas gubernatorial candidate and former mayor of Houston, Bill White. In 1976, Bhutto graduated with his thesis entitled "Modicum of Harmony". His thesis dealt with the spread of nuclear weapons in general, and the implications of India's nuclear weapons on Pakistan in particular. Murtaza went on to attend Christ Church Oxford, his father's alma mater, for a three-year MLitt degree course. Bhutto submitted his master thesis, containing a vast argumentative work on Nuclear strategic studies, where he advocated for Pakistan's right to develop its nuclear deterrence programme to counter Indian nuclear programme. While in Europe studying for his PhD studies, Benazir Bhutto had notified Murtaza Bhutto about the coup d'état led by General Zia-ul-Haq. Murtaza, along with his siblings, returned to Pakistan immediately. However, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto advised his children to leave the country in the shortest time possible. Murtaza was on the verge of rushing home when he received a message from his father asking him to remain abroad where he could mobilise an international campaign for his release.