US pledges to help Pakistan after Bhutto probe

The United States pledged Friday to help Pakistan develop democracy after a report said the country could have prevented the 2007 assassination of former prime minister Benazir Bhutto. The United States, which had encouraged Bhutto's decision to return to Pakistan to resolve political turmoil, "cooperated fully" with the UN probe, State Department spokesman Philip Crowley said. "The assassination was a tragedy for the people of Pakistan," Crowley told reporters. "Benazir Bhutto gave her life in defense of the development of Pakistan's democratic institutions." "We will continue to work with Pakistan to make sure that we build the institutions of democracy going forward," Crowley said. Crowley declined to comment on the particulars of the report, but said: "Tragically there were failures at a number of levels where she did not have the protection that she deserved and obviously needed." Bhutto, the first woman to become prime minister of a Muslim country, was killed on December 27, 2007 in a gun and suicide attack after addressing an election rally. Her death threw the world's only nuclear-armed Islamic nation into chaos, sparking violence and months of political turmoil that ended in September 2008 when her widower, Asif Ali Zardari, assumed the presidency. The United States has supported Zardari's civilian administration, last year approving a five-year, 7.5 billion-dollar package to build infrastructure and democratic institutions.