Unsolved cases: Another lawyer injured, bars protest today

Only one arrest in 20 murders of 2011.

KARACHI: Just days after the murder of a lawyer, another one was attacked, this time in Hub city, Balochistan.

Malik Muhammad Sadiq, a member of the Karachi Bar Association (KBA), was shot four times and had to be rushed to Jinnah hospital, Khalid Mumtaz, the KBA’s secretary, told The Express Tribune. The injured lawyer was operated upon immediately and his condition is stated to be out of danger.

“We were returning from the funeral of Maqboolur Rahman advocate, who was gunned down on Wednesday when this news shattered us,” he said announcing a boycott of court work on Friday.

A joint general body meeting would be held at the Sindh High Court Bar Association (SHCBA) as the situation has gone from bad to worse.

SHCBA President Anwar Mansoor Khan announced a protest and boycott of proceedings on Friday over the unabated killings of lawyers in Karachi and other parts of the country.

Lawyers killed in 2011

Twenty lawyers, including five in rural Sindh, and 15 members of the KBA fell victim to terrorism or personal disputes.

Most prominent among five lawyers from Sindh was Muhammad Ali Dahiri, who was a member of the Sindh Bar Council (SBC) also.

The list of lawyers who were members of the KBA includes: Sardar Zulfiqar, Altaf Hussain, Junaid Khan, Haneef Khan, Zia Alam, Faheem Riaz Siddiqui, Saleem Bhatti, Syed Mukhtar Bohkari, Muhammad Kamal, Nazar Abbas and Faheem-ul Karim.

Only the killers of Faheem-ul Karim were arrested by the police as they were under pressure from the Supreme Court which has been holding suo motu proceedings into Karachi violence, said Syed Haider Imam Rizvi, the immediate past honorary secretary of the KBA.

Published in The Express Tribune, January 13^th, 2012.