ISLAMABAD, Pakistan - Parliamentary elections scheduled for Jan. 8 have been postponed until February, an election commission official said Tuesday.

The official, speaking to the New York Times, was not more specific, but a Pakistani government source told NBC News that the elections would be in the second half of February.

The specific date will be announced Wednesday night in a nationwide address by President Pervez Musharraf, the source said, adding that an upcoming religious holiday prevented any earlier scheduling.

The election commission had earlier said that unrest following the killing of Benazir Bhutto would almost certainly force the postponement, despite opposition threats of street protests that happened.

Commission Secretary Kunwar Muhammad Dilshad told the Times that it would not be possible to hold the elections in a week because the printing of ballot papers stopped after Benazir Bhutto's assassination and because rioters had damaged election offices in Sindh Province.

The development came as an aide to Bhutto said the opposition leader had been planning to give two U.S. lawmakers a report accusing the ruling regime of working to rig the vote when she was killed Thursday.

Sen. Latif Khosa, a lawmaker from Bhutto’s Pakistan Peoples Party, said he did not know if her killing was linked to the 160-page report she was to give to Sen. Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania and Rep. Patrick Kennedy of Rhode Island at a meeting scheduled for a few hours after she was killed.

Vote interference alleged
The file outlined several instances of electoral interference, including one case where a major from the intelligence services sat with an election official when the official rejected the nomination papers of Peoples Party candidates, Khosa said.

Another official stopped a candidate from filing his nomination in the southwestern Baluchistan province, he said.

“The elections were to be thoroughly rigged, and the king’s party was to benefit in the electoral process,” he said, referring to the Pakistan Muslim League-Q party, which is allied with Musharraf.

Bhutto had repeatedly accused the government of rigging the vote, but rejected boycott calls by other opposition groups, saying she did not want leave the field open for Musharraf’s loyalists.

Bhutto’s killing last week thrust the country into crisis and triggered nationwide riots that killed 58 people and caused tens of millions of dollars in damage to homes, government offices and transport facilities. The violence has died down since Sunday amid a heavy police and army presence. Bhutto’s home province of Sindh was especially hard hit.

Opposition groups have demanded the elections proceed as scheduled, anticipating that sympathy votes and anger at Musharraf would lead to large electoral gains.

Former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, leader of another opposition party, threatened street protests if the vote was delayed. “We will agitate,” Sharif told The Associated Press on Monday. “We will not accept this postponement.”

Bhutto’s party, now led by her husband and son, accused Musharraf of wanting to delay the polls to allow public anger over her death to evaporate.

“There have been elections in conflict zones such as Iraq and Afghanistan so I find it difficult to understand why this election cannot be held on time,” Sherry Rehman, spokesman for Bhutto’s party, told Dawn TV.

U.S. wants definitive date
Britain and the United States were also eager for the vote to take place as scheduled, but have indicated they would accept a slight delay if technical reasons dictated one.

“The key here is that there be a date certain for elections,” Tom Casey, deputy spokesman for the U.S. State Department, said Monday. “We would certainly have concerns about some sort of indefinite postponement of the elections.

Bhutto was killed in a gun and suicide bomb attack that the government blamed on Islamic extremists.

Her husband and other opposition leaders have called for an international, independent investigation into the attack and accused Musharraf of failing to adequately protect her. Some close to Bhutto have alleged forces allied with Musharraf may have been involved.

“I hope the government will agree to our demand for foreign investigators to probe the assassination of Benazir Bhutto,” her widowed husband, Asif Ali Zardari, said. “If they avoid it, we will directly approach the world powers in this regard.”

Bhutto’s 19-year-old son, who was appointed symbolic head of her party, left Pakistan for Dubai on Tuesday along with his two sisters.

The government — which has rejected charges of involvement in Bhutto’s death — said in a statement it was “committed to a thorough and transparent investigation and will not shy away from receiving assistance from outside, if needed.”

U.S. sources said the United States had quietly joined calls for Pakistan to allow international experts assist the probe into Bhutto’s slaying. The officials said they expected an announcement soon that investigators from Britain’s Scotland Yard would be asked to play a significant role. Any U.S. involvement would be limited and low-key, they said.

Pakistan government delays elections

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan (CNN) -- Pakistan's parliamentary elections have been postponed until February 18 because of the unrest following the assassination of former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto.

The elections were originally scheduled for January 8, but that would have been "impossible" because of the time needed to re-do burned ballot papers and repair ransacked election offices, Chief Election Commissioner Justice Qazi Muhammad Farooq said on Wednesday.

The ensuing violence caused more than $200 million in damages and claimed at least 58 lives, according to the government.

Provincial officials also wanted the elections delayed until after the Muslim holy month of Muharram, which will begin around January 9 and end about February 6.

Kanwar Dilshad, the commission's secretary general, had earlier said a decision would be made after consulting with all the political parties.

However, spokesmen for Bhutto's Pakistan People's Party and Nawaz Sharif's Pakistan Muslim League-N party said neither had been formally consulted before the announcement.

Both opposition parties wanted the elections to go ahead as scheduled next week, hoping to capitalize on the sympathy following Bhutto's killing, and will now discuss their options.

"We will consult with the party leadership and the other political parties of Pakistan to evolve a strategy to protest against this delay in the election," PML-N senior joint secretary Siddiq Ul-Farooq said.

Sharif earlier told reporters that he believed President Pervez Musharraf -- who was scheduled to address the Pakistani nation on Wednesday evening -- intended to delay the vote because his party would not garner enough seats in parliament to rule.

The United States welcomed Pakistan's decision to announce a specific election date, fearing that the government might indefinitely delay the vote.

"It's important that there is a firm date for elections," National Security Council spokesman Gordon Johndroe said shortly after Wednesday's announcement. "We hope that all the political parties will work together to ensure a free and fair election."

Meanwhile, sources close to Bhutto earlier told CNN that, on the day she was killed, the former prime minister had planned to give visiting U.S. lawmakers a report accusing Pakistan's intelligence services of a plot to rig the elections.

Bhutto was assassinated last Thursday, hours before a scheduled meeting with U.S. politicians Patrick Kennedy and Arlen Specter.

A top Bhutto aide who helped write the report showed a copy to CNN.

"Where an opposing candidate is strong in an area, they [supporters of Musharraf] have planned to create a conflict at the polling station, even killing people if necessary, to stop polls at least three to four hours," the document says.

The report also accused the government of planning to tamper with ballots and voter lists, intimidate opposition candidates and misuse U.S.-made equipment to monitor communications of opponents.

"Ninety percent of the equipment that the USA gave the government of Pakistan to fight terrorism is being used to monitor and to keep a check on their political opponents," the report said.

The Pakistani government denied the allegations, with two Pakistani diplomatic sources calling the report "baseless." Rashid Qureshi, a spokesman for Musharraf, called the accusations "ridiculous" and said the election will be "free, fair and transparent."

One Bhutto source said the document was compiled at her request and said the information came from sources inside the police and intelligence services.

Senator Latif Khosa, who helped put Bhutto's report together, accused the powerful Inter-Services Intelligence of operating a rigging cell from a safe house in the capital, Islamabad. The goal, he said, was to change voting results electronically on election day.

"The ISI has set up a mega-computer system where they can hack any computer in Pakistan and connect with the Election Commission," he said.

Meanwhile, the Pakistan government said on Wednesday it had not ruled out international assistance in its investigation into Bhutto's death.

Caretaker Prime Minister Mohammadmian Soomro said the government would "take advantage" of France's offer of help if needed following a meeting with French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner, the state-run Associated Press of Pakistan said.

Foreign Ministry spokesman Mohammed Sadiq said the government was committed to a thorough and transparent investigation and was "open to receiving assistance from outside."

The comments contradicted the government's earlier insistence that it needed no outside help.

Asif Ali Zardari, who is effectively leading Bhutto's Pakistan People's Party, has called for a United Nations inquiry into his late wife's assassination.

But Pakistan's ambassador to the United States, Mahmud Ali Durrani, indicated in an interview with The New York Times that the government would not endorse a separate inquiry modeled after the U.N. investigation into the 2005 assassination of former Lebanese prime minister Rafik Hariri.

Such an international investigation, Durrani told the newspaper, posed "a lot of complications."

CNN