Since it arrived in the country ten days ago, the team from Metropolitan Police’s Counter-Terrorism Command has visited the site in Rawalpindi where Bhutto was attacked by a suicide bomber on December 27, reviewed forensic and technical evidence and questioned eyewitnesses and doctors who treated her.

Five British investigators arrived here on January 4 and they were subsequently joined by six more sleuths. The other members of the Scotland Yard team are still in Pakistan and likely to leave later this week, officials said. The sleuths are taking back evidence, including video footage of the attack, for analysis in British laboratories, they said. Over the last two days, members of the team again reconstructed the attack on Bhutto near Liaquat Bagh in Rawalpindi and thoroughly inspected the site.

They visited Rawalpindi General Hospital again and questioned doctors about the nature of Bhutto’s wounds.
Under the terms of the agreement between the British and Pakistani governments, the Scotland Yard team was brought in to establish the exact cause of Bhutto’s death, an issue which has become a matter of controversy.

The government initially said she sustained a fatal skull fracture but this was dismissed as “lies” by Bhutto’s Pakistan People’s Party. The PPP has also said the probe by the Scotland Yard team would be inadequate as it was not aimed at identifying the “planners, financiers and perpetrators” involved in the attack.