biography
| name: |
Bhutto, Zulfikar Ali
|
pronunciation:
[bootoh]
| sex:
| male
|
| lived:
| (1928–79)
|
| biography:
| Pakistani statesman, president (1971–3), and prime minister (1973–7), born in Larkana, Sind, SE Pakistan. He graduated from the universities of California and Oxford, and lectured in law at Southampton (1952–3) and in Pakistan. He became minister of commerce (1958), and foreign minister (1963), then founded the Pakistan People's Party (1967), which won the army-supervised elections in West Pakistan (1971). As president and prime minister he did much to rebuild national morale, introducing constitutional, social, and economic reforms. Opposition to his government strengthened among right-wing Islamic parties, and he was ousted by the army (1977). The military leader, General Zia ul-Haq, instituted proceedings against corruption, under which Bhutto was convicted of conspiring to murder and was sentenced to death in 1978. In spite of worldwide protest and appeals for clemency, the sentence was carried out. |
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