Mourning day: City braces for closure as ASWJ calls strike

Targeted attacks across Karachi claim 18 lives.

KARACHI:

As the city went through another bloody attack and its fiery fallout, Ahle Sunnat wal Jamaat, formerly the banned Sipah-e-Sahaba Pakistan, called for a strike on Wednesday (today) against the assassination attempt on its leader. A day of mourning will also be observed across the province.

If the murder attempt on Aurangzeb Farooqi, which claimed the lives of six people, was not enough, unidentified assassins shot dead at least 12 more people across Karachi, taking the death toll on Tuesday to 18. The Karachi chief of the banned SSP had narrowly escaped a murder attempt when motorcycle-riding attackers ambushed his convoy in Gulshan-e-Iqbal.

ASWJ spokesperson Akbar Saeed Farooqui told The Express Tribune that the ASWJ has appealed to the transporters and the business community to support its strike call to make it successful. The ASWJ has asked its workers not to take law into their hands.



The representatives of transporters and business associations, however, said they had not decided to support the strike call and would decide “after assessing the situation”.

Violence erupts

The attack on ASWJ chief had sparked violent protests in several areas of Karachi, including Nagan Chowrangi, New Karachi, North Karachi, Nazimabad, Lasbela, Abul Hasan Isphani Road, Sohrab Goth, Malir, National Highway, Patel Para, Mehmoodabad, Baloch Colony, Korangi and Gulberg areas.

As main thoroughfares were blocked by protesters and unidentified men fired aerial shots, all commercial activities were suspended in the affected areas. Public transport vehicles disappeared from the roads as violence erupted. “We stopped our vehicles around 5pm as mobs blocked the roads,” said Syed Mehmood Afridi, the Karachi Transport Ittehad general secretary.

The public transporters union has instructed its drivers not to operate their vehicles on Wednesday due to the volatile situation in view of the strike called by the ASWJ. “Public buses will not come out until the situation normalises,” he said. “We will observe the situation in the morning and then decide whether to run our buses or not.”

Targeted attacks

Earlier, two SSP workers, Abdul Hafeez and Ghulam Haider, were shot dead in Orangi Town when they were on their way to attend a workers convention at Nagan Chowrangi.

Also in Orangi Town, two men of the Shia community, Nadeem Akhtar and Syed Shahid, were gunned down. DSP Zahid Hussain said Akhtar was also associated with the Muttahida Qaumi Movement but may have been killed over sectarianism.

In Lines Area, two more men of the Deoband sect, Rozi Khan and Naimat Khan, were killed while another, Ateeq, was wounded in a targeted attack outside a mosque. DSP Usman Bajwa also linked their murder to sectarian violence.

An alleged criminal, Zainul Abideen, was killed by the bullet of his accomplices as the group made its escape after firing at an imambargah in New Karachi. DSP Chaudhry Akhtar said the man was associated with the SSP and was booked in two murder cases.

Near Radio Pakistan, 26-year-old Mazhar Zaheer was gunned down, Preedy police said. The body of Ghulam Hussain, 35, was found from a garbage dump within the Nabi Buksh police limits.

A young man, who has yet to be identified, was shot dead in Kamil Gali, Kharadar police said.

Gulshan-e-Iqbal police found a bullet-riddled body of a man, who has yet to be identified. Similarly, Eidgah police also found the body of a young man, which was shifted to the Edhi morgue at Sohrab Goth.

Shia funeral

The funeral of two Shia brothers, slain a day earlier in Nazimabad, was held at the Rizvia Imambargah. The participants also staged a protest and torched a passenger bus.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 26^th, 2012.