A British police report published today said Pakistani opposition leader Benazir Bhutto was killed by a head injury caused by a bomb blast and not a bullet.
Scotland Yard investigators also said all evidence suggested Mrs Bhutto had been attacked by one person, who fired shots and detonated explosives, and was not attacked by two people as many Pakistanis had speculated.
The only tenable cause for the rapidly fatal head injury in this case is that it occurred as the result of impact due to the effects of the bomb-blast
British government pathologist Nathaniel Cary
Former prime minister Mrs Bhutto was killed as she stood up through the sunroof of her armoured land cruiser to wave to supporters as she left an election rally in the city of Rawalpindi on December 27th.
The government said she was killed when the force of the bomb blast forced her head into a lever on the sunroof, but her political party and her husband said she was killed by a bullet.
"The only tenable cause for the rapidly fatal head injury in this case is that it occurred as the result of impact due to the effects of the bomb-blast," British government pathologist Nathaniel Cary said in the report.
Scotland Yard's conclusion drew scepticism from members of Bhutto's Pakistan People's Party who were with her when she was killed, and runs counter to what senior hospital officials say they were told privately by doctors who attended to Mrs Bhutto.
"We find it difficult to agree with the report about the cause of death, that she was not killed by the assassin's bullet," Sherry Rehman, the PPP spokeswoman who prepared Mrs Bhutto's body for burial saida.
The government and the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) say an al-Qaeda-linked militant chief based on the Afghan border was behind her killing.
The controversy over how she was killed has fuelled suspicion government agencies were involved in her assassination. President Pervez Musharraf has denied he or any security agency or the military were involved. In the face of the criticism, Mr Musharraf asked Britain's Scotland Yard to help investigate the murder.
No autopsy was carried out, at the request of Mrs Bhutto's family. Her husband, Asif Ali Zardari, said at the time an autopsy was unnecessary as it was clear she had been shot.
The British team only investigated how Mrs Bhutto was killed, not who was behind it. "She was assassinated in front of everybody. We need the culprits, we need the killers, we need to know who had a motive," said Babar Awan, a senior PPP official and leading lawyer.