PESHAWAR, May 12: The Peshawar High Court Bar Association has appealed to the people to observe a complete strike on Monday to denounce, what it called, “unleashing of state-sponsored fascism” on lawyers and political workers in Karachi on Saturday.

Speaking at a press conference at the Peshawar Press Club, PHCBA president Latif Afridi criticised the government move to hold Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry ‘hostage’ at the Karachi airport. He said the Muttahida Qaumi Movement was a ‘mercenary force’ which had been siding with the present regime since its coming to power in 1999.

He alleged that the armed men of the MQM had killed workers of opposition parties, thrashed lawyers outside the Sindh High Court building and attacked the offices of Aaj TV in Karachi.

The PHCBA chief said Gen Musharraf, MQM chief Altaf Hussain and Sindh Chief Minister Arbab Ghulam Rahim were responsible for the killing of people in Karachi, adding that the PHCBA would get an FIR registered against them.

He said Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry was supposed to address a function organised by the Sindh High Court Bar Association on Saturday, but the armed activists of the MQM had attacked the lawyers outside the building and law-enforcement personnel deputed there were looking on “helplessly”.

He said the killing of political workers and attacks on opposition rallies had exposed the real face of the MQM which had unleashed ‘organised terror’ on political forces opposing dictatorship in the country. Mr Afridi claimed that people involved in heinous crimes were running the affairs of Sindh government.