Jerusalem: Israel's ambassador to the United Nations, Dan Gillerman, has said that former Pakistani Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto, assassinated on Thursday, had expressed fears for her life in last e-mails she had sent him, a media report here said.

Gillerman told news portal Ynet that he had met Bhutto about three months ago, two weeks before she returned to Pakistan after eight years of self-exile, in United States and despite Pakistan not having diplomatic relations with Israel she maintained contacts with several Israeli figures.

"In her last e-mails she expressed a fear of being killed by extremist elements in Pakistan", the Israeli ambassador said. He said Bhutto had recently sent him a copy of her new autobiography, "Daughter of Destiny", which included a warm dedication to Israel.

"She wrote me of how she admired Israel and of her desire to see a normalisation in the relations between Israel and Pakistan, including the establishment of diplomatic ties," Gillerman told Ynet.

"She asked to meet me to discuss her plans, share her thoughts and concerns with me, as well as examine the possibilities of normalising relations between Israel and Pakistan," he said, adding that the Pakistani leader had even expressed an interest in meeting Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni.

Reports in the US media, based on e-mails earlier sent by Bhutto to friends, have also showed that she felt insecure by the security provided to her by the Pakistan government. If harmed in Pakistan, "I wld (would) hold Musharaf (sic) responsible," Bhutto wrote in the October email, revealed on air by CNN journalist Wolf Blitzer, who received it from Bhutto's friend Mark Siegel.

Bhutto had sent the email to Siegel on October 26, a week after a suicide bombing targeted her shortly after her return to Pakistan from exile.

 

Source : PTI