May 12, 2007	Saturday	Rabi-us-Sani 24, 1428

LARKANA, May 11: In what appeared to be a move to discourage lawyers from taking part in the rally to welcome Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry in Karachi on Saturday, police in parts of upper Sindh on Friday launched a crackdown on lawyers going to the provincial capital.

Police arrested six lawyers in Larkana and temporarily detained some lawyers in Shikarpur and Ghotki. At other places, heavy contingents of police were deployed on the highway with barricades to stop lawyers’ caravans.

However, these tactics failed to dampen the spirit of the lawyers, who, at places, removed police barricades and continued their journey in caravans and, at others, boarded on buses and coaches in small groups to avoid arrest.

In Larkana, former general-secretary of the High Court Bar Association (Larkana chapter), Babu Sarfraz Jatoi and lawyers Abdul Razzak Kolachi, Afzal Jagirani, Oshaq Sangi, Mohammed Aslam Jatoi and Ahmed Baloch were picked up from the local PML-N office. They were kept at the Market police station.

A police team tried to arrest Ayaz Soomro and Majid Bhurgari, president and general-secretary, respectively, of the Larkana District Bar Association from their chambers. But due to presence of a good number of lawyers, police failed to arrest them.Later, a caravan of lawyers, led by Ayaz Soomro, left for Karachi but was intercepted at Dharmaho Wah, the boundary of Larkana and Dadu districts. However, the lawyers continued their journey by removing barricades.

In Hyderabad, police picked up dozens of activists of opposition political parties in late night raids on their houses in Sadar, Hirabad, Pretabad and Latifabad. However, police failed to lay hands on prominent leaders as most of them were believed to have gone into hiding to avoid arrest, or have already reached Karachi to take part in Saturday’s rally.

In Shikarpur, police intercepted a van carrying 20 lawyers to Karachi near the Sindh Canal on Shikarpur-Sukkur Road. Police took the lawyers to the New Foujdari police station and detained them there, to release them in the evening.

Police parties had been deployed at various points in the district to stop lawyers’ caravans.

In Sukkur, a contingent of police laid a siege around the building of the session court, presuming that lawyers would emerge from the building in the shape of a rally and would be arrested.

Much to the disappointment of police, the lawyers adopted a different strategy and left for Karachi from another place in a caravan led by Sukkur High Court Bar Association president Imdad Awan and Shabbir Shar.

In Ghotki, police detained seven lawyers but released them in the evening.

Similar reports were also received from other parts of the interior of Sindh.