Death Toll In Pakistan Rioting Rises to 27

At least 27 people have been killed in violence across Pakistan following the death of opposition leader Benazir Bhutto.

Link: CNN Coverage

Deadly rioting erupted in several cities, with people looting, clashing with police, and setting buildings, trains and gas stations on fire.

The deaths include five killed in fire at a garment factory. Another six died from suffocation when a bank was set ablaze.

Media reports said about 200 banks were attacked across the nation. Vandals have also burned several trains and railway stations in Bhutto's province, forcing train service to be suspended.

The government sent troops into the streets of several cities, and witnesses in one city said soldiers have refused to let people out of their homes.

Paramilitary rangers were also given permission to shoot to stop rioters from damaging property.

The government announced three days of mourning for Bhutto, including the closing of schools, commercial centers and banks.

Thursday's killing of President Pervez Musharraf's most powerful political opponent has plunged Pakistan into turmoil and badly damaged plans to restore democracy in the nuclear-armed U.S. ally.

There are no plans to postpone the Jan. 8 parliamentary election.

Country Mourns Bhutto

Many among the mourners chanted for justice and blamed the government for their heroine's death. Others jostled to get a last glimpse of the flag-draped coffin. Some simply wept and hugged each other.

The funeral for assassinated opposition leader Benazir Bhutto on Friday in southern Pakistan was permeated with raw emotion for the hundreds of thousands of admirers who converged on her family's mausoleum in Garhi Khuda Bakhsh, Pakistan.

People crammed inside the cavernous hall, throwing rose petals on the coffin. Some cried out "Benazir is alive" as her body was laid to rest. One man fainted and another sobbed uncontrollably, crying "My sister has gone."

Bhutto's husband, Asif Ali Zardari, appeared composed, wearing a white cap typical of the Sindh province that's a family stronghold. He and the couple's 19-year-old son, Bilawal, helped lift the coffin into the grave. An Islamic cleric led mourners in prayers.

A vast crowd congregated outside, lining up in hundreds of rows for the prayers and later filing by to throw sand on the grave.

Some in the crowd shouted "general, killer!" and "army, killer" in reference to Musharraf, who recently retired as army chief and was accused by Bhutto supporters of being complicit in the slaying or -- at the least -- not providing her enough security. The government has denied that charge, and leaders of Bhutto's Pakistan People's Party tried to quiet the screamers.

Draped in the party's red, green and black flag, the coffin had been carried about three miles in a white ambulance from the Bhutto ancestral home to the vast marble mausoleum, at one point going by a passenger train that rioters had set ablaze in rage over the slaying.

Head Injury Killed Bhutto, Official Says

Bhutto died from a skull fracture suffered when she hit her head during a suicide attack, not from bullet wounds, the Interior Ministry said Friday.

Authorities on Thursday said she died from bullet wounds fired by a young man who then blew himself up, killing 20 other people. A surgeon who treated her said Friday she died from the impact of shrapnel on her skull.

But later Friday, Interior Ministry spokesman Javed Iqbal Cheema said all three shots missed her as she greeted supporters through the sunroof of her vehicle, which was bulletproof and bombproof.

He also denied that shrapnel caused her death, saying Bhutto was killed when she tried to duck back into the vehicle, and the shock waves from the blast knocked her head into a lever attached to the sunroof, fracturing her skull.

Cheema showed reporters a videotape of the attack, which showed Bhutto waving, smiling and chatting with supporters from the sunroof as her car sat unmoving on the street outside the rally. After, three gunshots rang out, the camera appeared to fall and the tape ended.

Cheema said that an "al-Qaida leader" congratulated his followers for the assassination of Bhutto, who said the government captured the remark by militant leader Baitullah Mehsud in an "intelligence intercept."

Pakistan's government has released a transcript of what it says was an intercepted conversation in which a militant leader claims responsibility for the death of Bhutto.

In the transcript, Mehsud is quoted as saying, "It was a spectacular job." He adds, "They were very brave boys who killed her."

The conversation is said to have been between Mehsud and another militant.

Mehsud is a commander of pro-Taliban forces in a lawless Pakistani tribal region where al-Qaida forces are active. His forces often attack Pakistani security personnel.

This fall, he was quoted in a Pakistani newspaper as saying he would greet Bhutto's return from exile with suicide bombers. He later denied that.

Cheema said Meshud was also behind the Karachi bomb blast in October against Bhutto that killed more than 140 people.

Mehsud is regarded as the commander of pro-Taliban forces in the lawless Pakistani tribal region South Waziristan where al-Qaida fighters are also active.

The FBI and Homeland Security reportedly told U.S. law enforcement agencies Thursday that al-Qaida has claimed responsibility for the assassination of the Pakistani opposition leader and former prime minister.

That word came in a bulletin that a law enforcement official summarized for The Associated Press. The official asked to remain anonymous, because he's not authorized to speak publicly about the bulletin.

The bulletin cites Islamist Web sites as the sources of the al-Qaida claim. The sites also say that al-Qaida's No. 2 leader, Ayman al-Zawahri, had planned the assassination. Al-Zawahri decried Bhutto's return in a video message this month and called for attacks on all the candidates in Pakistan's parliamentary elections.

Bhutto had pledged to redouble Pakistan's fight against Islamic militants. She had received threats from virtually all militant groups that make Pakistan their home. That includes al-Qaida and Taliban-style radicals and tribal insurgents along the Afghan border.