Ceriwis - Investigators Claim Family Rivalry, Not Taliban, Killed Pakistan's Christian Minister

Investigators Claim Family Rivalry, Not Taliban, Killed Pakistan's Christian Minister

In another twist in the probe into the assassination of Pakistan�s first Christian minorities� affairs minister, Shahbaz Bhatti, the joint investigation team formed by the government to trace his killers has claimed that family rivalry, and not the Taliban, had killed Shahbaz Bhatti, according to a media report.

Shahbaz Bhatti�s daylight murder in the federal capital Islamabad on March 2 earlier this year, is now being attributed to a property dispute between relatives. According to a report appearing in Pakistan's vernacular press, police investigators have concluded it was not a religiously-motivated murder despite the fact that the Punjabi Taliban had claimed responsibility for the assassination the very same day.

Taliban spokesman Ehsanullah Ehsan called several media organizations to claim responsibility for Bhatti�s murder because "he was advocating a review of the controversial blasphemy laws." The Pakistani government, meanwhile, had called on other countries not to link the Christian minister�s assassination with blasphemy. Pamphlets found from the murder site had also claimed that the Tehreek-e-Taliban Punjab, an affiliate of the al-Qaida, had executed Bhatti to punish him for pursuing a review of the blasphemy laws to stop its misuse against the minorities.

Justice appears to be a long time coming for the former minister�s family since the murderers have fled the country.

�Shahbaz Bhatti�s murder is said to be linked to a �chronic rivalry� with relatives who lived in Faisalabad five years ago,� revealed an investigator associated with the joint investigation team, according to the report. New clues have led the Islamabad police to a family, who left the country due to the rivalry with the Bhattis, the JIT claimed in its latest report.

The family was also residing in Bhatti�s native town Khushpur, which has produced famous priests and nuns, but some family members are now reportedly living in the United Arab Emirates. Two or three of them have converted to Islam and are living in Malaysia, one of the investigators reportedly claimed.