-
Police along with paramilitary forces crackdown on party workers in Karachi, Hyderabad
KARACHI/HYDERABAD: The paramilitary forces and the police on Saturday intercepted and prevented activists of the Muttahida Qaumi Movement-London (MQM-L) from visiting key graveyards in Karachi and Hyderabad to honour the late party workers.
The party has annually observed December 9 as the Martyrs’ Day, as party founder’s brother Nasir Hussain, and nephew Arif Hussain were killed on Dec 9, 1995, in Karachi. MQM-L’s leaders had urged their workers to visit the graveyard in Karachi’s Azizabad area.
However, a large number of the law enforcement personnel had been deployed at roads leading to the graveyard to thwart the attempt. A senior police officer said that around 50 persons, most of them women, tried to proceed, but the Rangers and the police did not allow them.
In Hyderabad, policewomen also had to push back MQM-L workers as they tried to enter a graveyard in the Pucca Qilla area to visit the graves of the party workers killed in different periods. The workers were pushed towards the shrine of Sakhi Abdul Wahab Shah Jillani. No untoward incident was reported.
The police had already padlocked the graveyard to prevent activists from visiting the graves of party workers. The roads leading to the fort had been closed with barbed wire from the Gari Khata and Guru Nagar sides since morning. Small streets that connect to the fort also remained closed with barbed wires.
Reportedly, the MQM-Pakistan hosted prayers ceremony in Latifabad to pay tribute to those party workers who were killed over the years in Karachi, Hyderabad, and other areas of the province.
