KARACHI: Former Muttahida Qaumi Movement convener and head of US-based advocacy group Voice of Karachi Nadeem Nusrat has survived an “assassination attempt” in Houston, his party said.

A statement received here stated that Mr Nusrat hosted an event in Houston on Sunday afternoon and left with VOK leader Shahid Farhad in a car.

It said that while travelling on Highway 59 South, Mr Farhad spotted a black SUV suspiciously trying to get closer to his vehicle and then he noticed “a hand coming out of the backseat window of the suspicious vehicle with a handgun”.

He instinctively pulled the brake resulting in misfire from the assailants. Multiple shots were fired. Mr Nusrat also witnessed empty bullet shells flying in the air and hitting the front portion of his vehicle, the statement said, adding that the attackers escaped on the highway.

“Mr Nusrat and Mr Farhad have lodged the official report at the local police station and informed pertinent authorities, who have started an investigation into the incident,” it said. Mr Nusrat was then the London-based convener of the unified MQM when party founder Altaf Hussain made an incendiary speech on Aug 22, 2016. Later, the party in Pakistan sacked him replacing him with Dr Farooq Sattar as the convener of the coordination committee of the MQM-Pakistan.

He then led the London faction of the MQM as its convener and later parted ways with Mr Hussain and moved back to the US, where he first launched a ‘Free Karachi’ campaign and then turned it into the Voice of Karachi advocacy group.

Published in Dawn, July 14th, 2021