Will Bhutto's children join politics?

ISLAMABAD: Three years ago former Pakistan premier Benazir Bhutto's husband Asif Ali Zardari had expressed a desire to see their three children join politics.

With Bhutto, 54, being killed in a suicide attacker in Rawalpindi yesterday, the limelight is now shifted to her three teenaged children, two daughters and a son.

Zardari, who was in Karachi in December 2004, told a Pakistan People's Party (PPP) delegation that he would like to see Bilawal, Bakhtawar and Asifa start their political careers with the party's students federation and its women's wing.

"Mr Zardari said he wanted Bakhtawar and Asifa to learn from the seniors in the ladies' wing," Nafisa Raja, then president of the Karachi chapter of the PPP, was quoted as saying by the Daily Times.

Zardari also hinted that he would expect his son to join the PPP students body.

Bhutto's daughters Bakhtawar, 17, and Asifa, 14, are studying in Dubai, while her 19-year-old son Bilawal is enrolled at Oxford.

Bilal is on an Eid break and was to return to London next week to resume his studies. Just 10 days ago, Bhutto and Zardari celebrated their 20th wedding anniversary.

Zardari, 51, who was with his three children in their sprawling bungalow in Dubai when the news of the assassination was broken to him, initially refused to believe that Bhutto was dead.

When the news did sink in, he said, "We are devastated. It is a shock."