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Thursday, December 27, 2007 RAWALPINDI, Pakistan ? Pakistan's paramilitary forces were on red alert Thursday following the assassination of opposition leader Benazir Bhutto. The former prime minister was murdered by an attacker who shot her in the neck and chest after a campaign rally and then blew himself up. Her death stoked new chaos across the nuclear-armed nation, an important U.S. ally in the war on terrorism. At least 20 others were also killed in the homicide bombing that immediately followed Bhutto's shooting. Bhutto's supporters erupted in anger and grief after her killing, attacking police and burning tires and election campaign posters in several cities. At the hospital where she died, some smashed glass and wailed, chanting slogans against President Pervez Musharraf. Musharraf blamed Islamic extremists for Bhutto's death and said he would redouble his efforts to fight them. "This is the work of those terrorists with whom we are engaged in war," he said in a nationally televised speech. "I have been saying that the nation faces the greatest threats from these terrorists. ... We will not rest until we eliminate these terrorists and root them out." In the U.S., President Bush strongly condemned the attack "by murderous extremists who are trying to undermine Pakistan's democracy." A doctor on the team that treated her said she had a bullet in the back of the neck that damaged her spinal cord before exiting from the side of her head. Another bullet pierced the back of her shoulder and came out through her chest. She was given open heart massage, but the main cause of death was damage to her spinal cord, the doctor said on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media. "At 6:16 p.m., she expired," said Wasif Ali Khan, a member of Bhutto's party who was at Rawalpindi General Hospital. "The surgeons confirmed that she has been martyred," Bhutto's lawyer Babar Awan said. (less)