KARACHI: Showing some reservations on government proposed ‘apolitical targeted operation’ in Karachi, Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) chief Altaf Hussain Wednesday night said an operation conducted with honesty and aimed at restoring peace will be welcomed by the party, DawnNews reported.

Speaking to members of MQM’s Rabita (Coordination) Committee in Karachi, he said the party will support any official action aimed at eradicating terrorism.

While opposing MQM’s demands of handing over the port city to Pakistani armed forces, Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan on Wednesday evening had said that a non-political targeted operation will be carried out by civil armed forces to restore peace in the metropolis.

“The proposed operation should not turn into the 1992 operation, which was initiated with claims of capturing 72 big fishes and later switched towards targeting MQM,” said Hussain.

He said a durable peace in Karachi – termed as financial hub of the country – was the need of Pakistan.

Pointing towards Safari Park ‘encounter’ in Karachi, in which several high level police officials were killed and injured in an exchange of fire with terrorists, the MQM chief suggested that solving the case will be a ‘key’ to success of any targeted operation conducted in Karachi.

In a five-hour-long encounter inside Safari Park on August 15, two police officers and three suspects were killed while five policemen, including two station house officers, sustained gunshot wounds.

“Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan should treat the police encounter as a test case for himself,” said Altaf Hussain.