London: "Long live Bhutto" were the last words of former Pakistan premier Benazir Bhutto before three gunshots rang out and she slumped back on to a seat in her car, a media report claimed today.

"She (Bhutto) did not say anything more," Safdar Abbassi, the slain PPP leader's chief political advisor, who was sitting behind her, told the Sunday Telegraph.

"All of a sudden there was the sound of firing. I heard the sound of a bullet. I saw her (Bhutto): she looked as though she ducked in when she heard the firing. We did not realise that she had been hit by a bullet," Abbassi said.

He said he had looked up to see Bhutto by sliding back through the aperture in the roof of her car and moments later, the vehicle was rocked by a huge explosion and there was no sound form Bhutto.

Abbassi said when he leaned forward to see what was wrong, it appeared that she have escaped injury and later noticed the blood, which was seeping from a deep wound on the left side of her neck.

He said his wife, Naheeb Khan, cradled Benazir's head in her lap, reaching up for her own headscarf, pulling it from her head, pressing it into the wound, trying to stem the flow. But the wound was deep and the blood seeped out, spreading down her neck and across her blue tunic.

"As Bhutto walked from the podium, she turned and urged me to join her in working the crowd," Abbassi said, adding Bhutto said, "Why don't you join me?"

"Bhutto was smiling and extremely happy. She took me inside the car and sat in front of me. I started chanting slogans because there were crowds all around," he told the paper.

Source : PTI