Karachi
Armed
men roamed the city streets for yet another day on Wednesday and
targeted three people, including a former UC Nazim and a school
principal, in separate incidents.
Syed Ali Haider, 55,
was gunned down when two armed men on a motorcycle sprayed his car with
bullets from sophisticated weapons outside his residence in Sector 11/A
of North Karachi in the Sir Syed Town police area.
The
victim’s family and residents of the area took the body to the Abbasi
Shaheed Hospital for legal formalities. An MLO said the deceased
suffered at least five bullets wounds to the upper body.
SP
New Karachi Syed Salman told The News that Haider was the owner of the
Lal Qilla Grammar School and also the principal of the same institute.
He added that the deceased was a member of the Arts Council and was also
a candidate for president of the council.
He suspected that the victim was murdered in a targeted attack.
Former UC Nazim killed
Mahmood
Ahmed Barkati, 87, a Hakeem and former UC Nazim was gunned down by two
armed men who barged into his clinic near the Taleem-e-Bagh situated in
the FB Area. The victim was gunned down with an automatic weapon and the
assailants managed to flee on their motorbike.
The dispenser of the clinic, after hearing the shots, rushed to the doctor’s room and saw the body lying in a pool of blood.
The police were immediately informed and they shifted the corpse to the Abbasi Shaheed Hospital for legal formalities.
An MLO said that Barkati had been shot three times in the upper body.
SP
Gulberg Amir Farooqi told The News that the deceased was killed in a
targeted incident. Apart from being a Hakeem, the victim was a noted
writer and had authored more than 24 books. He also wrote some 500
columns in different newspapers. Barkati, the police confirmed, was also
a former UC Nazim from the Jamaat-e-Islami.
MQM activist shot dead
Thirty-five-year-old
Syed Muhammad Shakeel, an MQM activist, suffered bullet wounds when two
armed motorcyclists sprayed him with bullets from an automatic weapon
while he was riding his own bike near Sector 11-1/2 of Orangi Town in
the Iqbal Market police jurisdiction.
The rescue team was
called to take the body to the hospital, but the injured man breathed
his last on the way to the Abbasi Shaheed Hospital.
It
was found that the victim had been shot four times in the upper part of
the body. A mobile van of the Iqbal Market police reached the spot some
20 minutes after the incident and found the empty shells of 9MM bullets
from the scene of the crime.
The police confirmed that
the murdered man was an MQM activist and was targeted in this incident.
As news of his death spread in the area, miscreants came onto the
streets and forcibly ordered shop owners to close their businesses.
Altaf condemns killing
The
Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) chief has expressed grief over the
murder of Ali Haider, the owner of Lal Qila Grammar School. In a
statement issued from London on Wednesday, Altaf Hussain termed the
killing a conspiracy to provoke sectarian strife in Karachi.
Terrorists
are gunning down innocent people according to a planned conspiracy to
push the city into the flames of sectarian violence and bloodshed, he
added.
He appealed to President Asif Ali Zardari, Prime
Minister Raja Pervez Ashraf, Interior Minister Rehman Malik, Sindh
Governor Dr Ishratul Ebad Khan and Sindh Chief Minister Syed Qaim Ali
Shah to take notice of Haider’s murder and bring the killers to book.
He
expressed his sympathies for the bereaved family members, and said
their grief was equally shared by the workers and office-bearers of the
MQM.