No request from Pak to probe Benazir's assassination: UN

United Nations, Jan 8 : The United Nations has not received any request from the Pakistan Government for help in investigating the "tragic" assassination of former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has said.

Moon pointed out that the Scotland Yard was already extending technical assistance to Islamabad in the inquiry.

Asked about the demands for a UN investigation from Benazir Bhutto's family, the Moon said: "I am not in a position to comment on a request at any private and personal level."

He declined to comment on whether the UN should be an organisation to investigate such political assassinations.

So far as establishing special tribunals, as had happened in the case of assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafiq Hariri, was concerned, Moon said it must be based on the request of the government concerned and must be decided by the UN Security Council and member states of the UN.

The UN had undertaken the inquiry into the Hariri assassination at the request of the Lebanese Government, and it's now in the process of establishing a special tribunal to try the suspects if and when identified, The News quoted Moon, as saying.

ANI