KARACHI, May 13: The Muttahida Qaumi Movement has closed down its offices across the country for an indefinite period and set up two camps for workers and sympathisers forced to leave their homes in the suburban areas following armed attacks.
“The coordination committee has decided to close down all sector and unit offices in the country for an indefinite period to foil the conspiracy to engineer ethnic riots,” deputy convener of the MQM Dr Farooq Sattar told a press conference at the party’s headquarters, Nine-Zero, on Sunday evening.
“Today, terrorists of opposition parties carried out armed attacks in several areas and forced not only our workers and supporters but also our Punjabi, Pakhtun and minority workers to flee their respective localities,” he said, adding that the party had set up two camps in Azizabad for all the displaced families.
Dr Sattar gave a detailed account of what he called atrocities on his party workers and supporters and attacks on party offices in Karachi, Sindh’s interior and other parts of the country. “Hundreds of MQM workers living in suburbs of the city were forced to migrate but we did not react.”
He said people in different areas of Orangi Town, Qasba Colony, Muzaffarabad Colony, Sherpao Colony, Sohrab Goth, Azeempura, Baldia Town, Lyari and other localities were attacked, tortured and injured by terrorists who wanted to engineer ethnic riots in the city on the pattern of what had happened in 1986.
He accused opposition parties, including the Awami National Party and the Muttahida Majlis-i-Amal, of hatching a conspiracy to divide the peaceful population of Karachi on ethnic and linguistic lines to destroy the peace of the city and derail the democratic process. “The attacks on peaceful rallies of the MQM, particularly in those areas which are not supposed to be the party’s strongholds, and killing of innocent people was a part of the conspiracy aimed at restricting the MQM to its traditional constituencies.”
He appealed to ANP chief Asfandyar Wali to tell his people that there was no clash of interests between the Pakhtuns and the Mohajirs and and suggested that he avoid giving statements that create chaos.
He vowed not to allow terrorists and opposition parties to destroy the peace of the metropolis. He demanded an immediate arrest of people responsible for Saturday’s violence and subsequent attacks on MQM workers, supporters and offices.
MQM leader Babar Ghauri alleged on the occasion that the ANP wanted to improve its declining popularity graph in the NWFP by “doing politics on bodies”.
MNA Hyder Rizvi denounced PPP leader Aitzaz Ahsan for criticising the MQM in an earlier press conference in Islamabad and said that his party had been involved in several incidents of terrorism, including the hijacking of a plane and firing of rockets on an oil refinery.
Other members of the MQM coordination committee also spoke.