Awami Tehreek announces rally in Lyari to pay homage to May 22 dead

AT General Secretary says measures for rally in final phases.

KARACHI: The Awami Tehreek and Karachi City Alliance announced on Friday that they will hold a public gathering in Lyari on Sunday for peace in Karachi and to pay tribute to those who were killed in an attack on the Muhabbat-e-Sindh rally on May 22.

Awami Tehreek (AT) General Secretary Anwar Soomro while addressing a joint news conference with the Karachi City Alliance (KCA) at the Karachi Press Club on Friday said that the rally will be held at Shaheed Rehman Park Lyari (formerly known as Gabol Park) on Sunday at 4pm. AT Central President Ayaz Latif Palijo and Chairman of KCA Sardar Uzair Jan Baloch among other leaders will address the rally.

“The arrangements for the rally are in their final stages of completion. We have invited political and religious parties to participate in the rally and most of them have assured their participation,” said Soomro. “We appeal the people of Sindh to join us in turning Karachi back into the city of lights that it used to be,” he added.

Soomro criticised the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) government for conducting targeted operation in Lyari on Muttahida Qaumi Movement’s (MQM) demands and crushing innocent Baloch children with tanks,

“Karachi was once the city of lights but the PPP government handed it over to the terrorists for its so called policy of reconciliation,” lamented an angry Soomro. He added that the PPP government has turned Karachi into a slaughterhouse where innocent Baloch youth were being targeted and killed every day.

He further said that former Minister for Interior Rehman Malik had conducted an operation in Lyari to make the MQM happy, “It was Lyari and its people who voted for Benazir Bhutto and gave her protection. It was Sardar Abdur Rehman Baloch a brave young man of Lyari who saved Benazir Bhutto’s life in the Karsaz attack.”

Soomro said that the assailants of May 22 incident have yet to be arrested, which goes to show the biasness of the PPP government towards the Baloch and Sindhi people. “Those who conduct rallies against the division of Sindh are treated with bullets and head monies while those who conduct rallies for the division of Sindh are given police protocol and welcomed with juice which shows the brutality of the PPP government.”

A number people belonging to Awami Tehreek, Sindhyani  Tehreek and Karachi City Alliance were present at the occasion.