KARACHI, March 18: Leaders of different political parties at a demonstration on Sunday urged the masses to forge unity and protest against the illegal and barbaric actions taken against the judiciary and media by the rulers, who after watching the reaction of the masses had started their retreat.

Speaking at the demo organised by the Muttahida Majlis-i-Amal at Liaquatabad Dakkhana, they said army rulers, who had dismissed a democratically elected government, were now trying to attack the two other state pillars – judiciary and media.

Jamaat-i-Islami’s Dr Mairajul Huda Siddiqui, Zubair Khan of Tehreek-i-Insaf, Basharat Mirza of PDP, Mohammad Aslam and Javed Khan of the MMA and others also spoke.

They said General Musharraf thought he could easily succeed in getting resignation from Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry by calling him and threatening him at the Army House. But the refusal of chief justice surprised the general who started committing more such mistakes. After the countrywide resistance and demonstrations by lawyers and the masses, which were being reported by the media, the ill-advised general tried to take action against media so that journalists could be cowed down and the countrywide protests could go unreported.

TREE FELLING: The Muttahida Majlis-i-Amal has condemned the city government for inviting an environmental disaster by uprooting trees on a large scale across the city and demanded an immediate halt to the practice.