Pakistan’s ambassador to the United States said on Monday that his government would welcome outside experts to help investigate the assassination of Benazir Bhutto, reversing Pakistan’s earlier rejection of international help.

But the ambassador, Mahmud Ali Durrani, said his government would not endorse a separate inquiry modeled after one carried out by the United Nations after the assassination of Rafik Hariri, a former Lebanese Prime Minister, in 2005.

“Pakistan is open to international expertise, international support and international help because it’s in our interests,” Durrani said in a telephone interview. He added that details of any assistance still needed to be worked out.

After Bhutto’s death last Thursday, the United States offered to send forensic specialists from the FBI, and Britain said it could provide technicians from Scotland Yard to assist Pakistani investigators. But the government of President Pervez Musharraf has refused the offers, saying it was capable of conducting any investigations itself. However, with calls growing inside and outside Pakistan for some outside review, the Pakistani government seems to have backed away from its earlier position.

A State Department official said on Monday that the US had been pressing Islamabad to allow international involvement in the inquiry to give it credibility with Bhutto’s supporters and others.

The American official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said that Pakistan had quietly been discussing options with Scotland Yard, and that the FBI was ready to fly forensic experts to Pakistan. “They’re trying to hammer something out over the next couple of days,” the official said of senior Pakistani officials.

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