May 23, 2007	Wednesday	Jamadi-ul-Awwal 06, 1428

PESHAWAR, May 22: Chairman of Pakistan Tehrik-i-Insaf Imran Khan on Tuesday asked political parties to avoid forging alliances with the Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) as long as Altaf Hussain was its head.

“Altaf Hussain is a terrorist,” he said during his address to the Peshawar High Court Bar Association (PHCBA).

Imran Khan alleged that the MQM leader was inciting people to violence. He spoke of his intention to visit London in early June to file a case in the British courts in this regard.

He added that he had started collecting evidence of MQM’s involvement in the Karachi carnage of May 12.

“Prime Minister Tony Blair has killed thousands of people under the pretext of their involvement in terrorism, but he is himself giving sanctuary to a terrorist,” remarked Mr Khan.

In a room packed to capacity, Mr Khan praised the legal community for its struggle for independence of the judiciary. Referring to the presidential reference against Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry, he expressed confidence in the Supreme Court’s ‘independence’.

He termed the lawyers’ campaign a ‘defining’ one because “the judiciary has never resisted a powerful dictator as it is now doing.”

Mr Khan said that political parties ought to learn from the legal community which had, despite diverging political affiliations, united on a one-point agenda regarding the presidential reference against the chief justice.

Praising the role played by the media during the judiciary crisis, Mr Khan said that it had exposed both the MQM and Mr Hussain on May 12. “The MQM is not a political party but an organisation that secures votes through the barrel of a gun,” he claimed. “People were killed in Karachi while MQM activists were dancing to the sound of drums. It was the same in Islamabad, where during his rally the president praised the MQM.”

Mr Khan accused Mr Hussain of trying to use the ethnicity card and of creating divisions among people. “President Musharraf is trying to transmit a soft and liberal image to the US, but he has allied himself with the number one terrorist in Pakistan,” said Mr Khan.

“The president has committed a fatal blunder and he should not get away with it; he is out to defame the Pakistani nation in a bid to prolong an illegitimate rule.”