31 July 2004	Saturday	13 Jamadi-us-Saani 1425

KARACHI, July 30: The Muttahida Majlis-i-Amal has asked the government to refrain from sending Pakistan army to Iraq and warned if the troops were dispatched to Iraq, the airport and sea port would be besieged.

The chief of Jamaat-i-Islami Karachi and MMA leader, Dr Mairajul Huda Siddiqui, was addressing a protest demonstration outside Masjid-i-Baitul Mukarrum in Gulshan-i-Iqbal after Friday prayers. The demo was staged on the appeal of MMA chief Qazi Hussain Ahmad to protest against martyrdom of two Pakistanis and sending Pakistani troops to Iraq.

The protest rallies were also organized outside dozens of mosques in the city which were addressed by MMA leaders. The speakers at the rally expressed their sorrow and grief over the death of two Pakistanis and demanded of the government to declare that army troops would not be sent to Iraq.

Holding the government responsible for the murder of two Pakistanis in Iraq, Dr Mairajul Huda Siddiqui said that Raja Azad and Sajid Naeem could have been saved if the government had declared that Pakistani troops would not be sent to Iraq.

He said that it would be betrayal from Ummah to send the Pakistani troops to safeguard the US interest and the US army in Iraq. "The people of Pakistan would never allow the government to send our army to Iraq," he said.

The MMA leader said that the wrong policies of Musharraf government had made the country insecure and any further delay in announcement about troops would endanger the life of Pakistanis in Iraq.

Mairajul Huda Siddiqui said if the government wanted to send the troops it should send them to Palestine and occupied Kashmir where Israel and India were massacring Muslims.

He recalled that Philippine had withdrawn her army from Iraq to save the life of one citizen while India which was a close friend of the US had announced not to dispatch its troops to Iraq.