She came from a political family steeped in Pakistan's turbulent history. Her father -- also a former premier -- and her two brothers all died violent deaths as Pakistan struggled to come to terms with its identity since its birth 60 years ago.

Bhutto, 54, had just addressed a campaign rally for Jan. 8 parliamentary elections when the suicide bomber blew himself up at the venue in Rawalpindi, near the capital Islamabad, killing her and at least 10 other people.

It was the second suicide attack targeting Bhutto since she returned from eight years of self-imposed exile in October. The first struck a welcome home rally, killing 139 people.

Over the next two months she led opposition to President Pervez Musharraf, notably during his six-week state of emergency, all the time cannily steering her Pakistan People's Party -- the largest opposition group in the country -- into contesting elections.

Educated at Oxford and Harvard, Bhutto became the first female premier of a Muslim country when she took the helm in Pakistan in 1988.

Her father, also a Pakistani prime minister, was hanged by the military in 1979.

Recalling standing at his grave, she once wrote: "At that moment I pledged to myself that I would not rest until democracy had returned to Pakistan."

Often seen in the western world as an icon of democracy in a conservative Muslim Pakistan, Bhutto was one of the country's shrewdest politicians.

Her political skill stemmed from her blood-stained family history, years of combat against a former military regime from jail -- and finally two terms in power in the shark-infested waters of Pakistani politics.

"I didn't choose this life, it chose me," she wrote in the introduction to her memoir, "Daughter of the East."

"Born in Pakistan, my life mirrors its turbulence, its tragedies and its triumphs."

Bhutto was born in Karachi on June 21, 1953 into a powerful land-owning dynasty. She was the oldest of four children of her Westernized father and an Iranian Shiite mother.

It was a heritage that would both give her a sense of destiny and weigh her down.

After attending convent schools in Pakistan, she went to Oxford University, becoming the first Asian woman to head its prestigious Oxford Union debating society.

But months after she returned to Pakistan in 1977, her father Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, by now prime minister, was deposed by General Zia-ul-Haq, and she and her family were detained. On April 4, 1979 her father was executed.

She remained under detention until 1984, when Zia allowed her to leave for England where she became the leader in exile of her father's party.

Tragedy struck again in 1985 when her brother Shah Nawaz died of poisoning in his apartment in the south of France.

In 1987 she entered an arranged marriage with businessman Asif Ali Zardari, with whom she has three children.

Revenge -- and the path to government -- came on Aug. 17, 1988 when Zia died in a mysterious plane crash. Within months, Bhutto's party won elections and on Dec. 2 she was sworn in as prime minister at the age of 35.

But her government was dismissed in 1990 amid corruption claims, which she denied, and she was replaced by Nawaz Sharif -- the man Musharraf eventually ousted in 1990.

Although re-elected in 1993, three years later she was thrown out again by then president, Farooq Leghari, on further graft charges.

Her sacking was just weeks after her other brother Murtaza, who was accused of involvement in terrorism, was shot dead in Karachi.

Bhutto's husband was jailed on a variety of charges in 1996 -- he was freed in 2004 -- while Bhutto went into self-imposed exile in April 1999.

© 2007 Agence France-Presse