LARKANA, July 21: The Larkana Chamber of Commerce and Industry has threatened that the local traders will stop paying taxes if the government continued to fail to safeguard their life, property and honour.

Instead, the traders' body said, the tax amount would be spent on adopting security measures. Speaking at a press conference here on Tuesday, the chamber president, Iqbal Shaikh, said that people of Larkana had been left at the mercy of criminals.

Citing examples of kidnapping of rice trader Santosh Kumar and some recent robberies, he said that Larkana district had been infested with crime and police had failed in containing crime.

He said that the traders of Larkana had generously donated for the establishment of '15' police emergency centre but its staff did not attend telephone calls. Mr Shaikh warned that if the situation remained unchanged, the traders would wind up their business and take to the streets.

He demanded early recovery of Mr Kumar, arrest of the killers of seven-year old Mohammed Amin Soomro and award of capital punishment to them. Meanwhile, under the banner of the City Action Committee, around 100 members of traders' bodies, political parties, NGOs and Hindu Panchayat observed a token hunger strike outside the Jinnah Bagh to pressure police for the recovery of Mr Kumar.

BODY FOUND: The body of a seven-year-old boy, Mohammed Amin Soomro, was found floating in the Abro Wah passing through Larkana city on Tuesday. The boy, resident of Lahori Mohalla, had gone missing three days back, his parents said.