UK Metropolitan Police’s Anti-Terrorism Command Unit quizzed a senior Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) leader for several hours during searches at two North West London addresses on Thursday, including a house owned by MQM chief Altaf Hussain, Pakistan Today learnt on Friday.
According to a source privy to the events in London, the British police questioned MQM senior leader Raza Haroon for three to five hours during a search of the establishment owned by Altaf Hussain. The details of the questioning could not be ascertained.
Raza Haroon is a former cabinet minister of the Sindh government and was recently taken off the MQM Coordination Committee by the party chief.
More than two dozen members of the police, including forensic scientists and members of the Serious and Organised Crime Agency (SOCA), took part in the high-profile operation.
The involvement of SOCA shows that while investigating the killing of Dr Imran Farooq, British authorities are also looking at the “money laundering” aspect and the net of the investigation involves more than what is widely known.
Talking to Pakistan Today from Karachi, Engineer Nasir Jamal of the MQM Coordination Committee said the party had already announced its full cooperation to the British police in the investigations into Dr Farooq’s murder.
Jamal said that he was not privy to the details of the search operation carried out at the residence owned by his party chief.
Asked about Raza Haroon’s interrogation by the British police, Jamal said that he did not have any such information. “I don’t think Mr Haroon is in Karachi these days and I don’t have any information whether he was present in Altaf Hussain’s residence at the time of the raids,” he said.
Raza Haroon’s cell number in Pakistan was turned off and calls to his Karachi residence number went unattended.
Dr Imran Farooq was stabbed to death outside his home in Edgware, north London, in September 2010, when he was returning from work. His killing shocked Pakistan and Britain as the killing was executed in a highly professional manner and left the Metropolitan Police, one of the most professional investigating police forces in the world, with a lot of painstaking investigation.
Dr Farooq was a close colleague of Altaf Hussain and among the party’s founders. The MQM has always maintained that it wants Dr Farooq’s killers brought to justice.