KARACHI, Oct 31: The Muttahida Majlis-i-Amal on Tuesday staged a protest rally to condemn the bombing of a madressah (a religious seminary) in Bajaur resulting in massacre of over 82 innocent students and teachers and demolition of a mosque.
The participants of the rally, which was part of the countrywide protest call by the central leader of MMA Qazi Hussain Ahmad, expressed solidarity with the people of Bajaur and condemned the bombing.
Deputy chief of Jamaat-i-Islami and MMA central leader Prof Ghafoor Ahmad, who was the main speaker at the rally, demanded severe punishment to perpetrators of the bombing. He said that the rulers were not representatives of the people of Pakistan but stooges of the US that was why neither the so-called Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz and nor Foreign Minister Khurshid Mehmud Kasuri, had courage to utter a word against violation of the sovereignty and solidarity of Pakistan by the US.
Pointing out that after 9/11, Gen Musharraf and his colleagues had totally surrendered before the US and had become its henchmen as a result in Pakistan, anti-army slogans were being raised. He said that Gen Musharraf and his colleagues were responsible for this situation.
He said that the US bombing on Bajaur was an attack on the sovereignty of Pakistan, which was not for the first time, as in the past too the US aeroplanes had many times violated airspace of Pakistan and lobbed bombs in tribal areas but the Pakistan government never demonstrated the courage to protest against the US.
Prof Ghafoor recalled that when Damadola village was bombed by the US forces in last January flaring up countrywide protest against killing many innocent people, Washington clarified the US position by pointing out that the Musharraf government had given the permission to flyover Pakistani territory in hot pursuit of Al Qaeda members and Taliban and their air strike was the outcome of the reports about presence of Aiman Alzahwairi.
He said that now the entire nation was in protest against the attack on the solidarity and sovereignty of Pakistan, the rulers were not only spectators but owning the killing of their own innocent people by claiming that the bombing was carried out by their gunship helicopters.
Prof Ghafoor recalled the contribution of the tribal people of Pakistan of defending borders when India was invading East Pakistan. But, he lamented, the defective policies of the regime had now resulted in deploying its 80,000 army on the western border.
Jamiat Ulema-i-Islam (JUI-F) leader Maulana Abdul Karim Abid said that the US, after failing to achieve its objectives and facing setback in Afghanistan and Iraq at the hands of people’s resistance, was trying to escape from the situation.
MMA Karachi President Siddique Rathore said despite confession by the US about bombing in Bajaur the Pakistani government spokesman was claiming that air strike was carried out by Pakistan’s gunship helicopters. He said those who were responsible for the bombing should be tried for murdering innocent and unarmed people.
Tehreek-i-Insaf Sindh chief Zubair Khan said that Gen Musharraf’s rule would go down in the history as the darkest period of the military rulers for failing to rise to defend the sovereignty of the country.
Jamiat Ahle Hadith leader Afzal Sardar said that anyone who took up arms against Muslims was no more from the Ummah and as such his place would be in the hell.
Other speakers included Islami Tehreek leader Maulana Kausar Abbas Naqvi and Basharat Mirza of Pakistan Democratic Party while Dr Mairajul Huda Siddiqui led the prayer and Nasrullah Shaji conducted the meeting.
The participants of the protest rally, which was held in front of the Empress Market, were holding MMA flags and holding banners against the US and Gen Musharraf. During the protest demonstration, the US flag was trampled under their feet and set on fire.
KARACHI, Oct 31: The Muttahida Majlis-i-Amal on Tuesday staged a protest rally to condemn the bombing of a madressah (a religious seminary) in Bajaur resulting in massacre of over 82 innocent students and teachers and demolition of a mosque.
