According to the BHRO press release parading of the children on national TV was against their basis Human Rights. “The Baloch children were humiliated and psychologically tormented by the media parade. Such actions by state forces and media are a clear violation of the ‘UN Convention on the Rights of the Child’.”

The BHRO further said Pakistani forces have abducted six more Baloch from Aziyan bazar in Mand town of Balochistan. The victims were names as Javed, Imran, Haneef, Delawar, Mullah Kamalan and Muslim on 19 March, 2013. However, Javed, Imran and Haneef were released later on but the rest are still being illegally held.

“On the other hand the Iranian forces offensive and targeting of Baloch people continues. Zameer S/O of Jumma a resident of Hab town of Balochistan was killed and dumped in Mand area by Iranian forces,” BHRO said.

The Baloch Human Rights Organisation has urged the International Human Rights Organisations and Organisations working for the protection of Children’s right to take notice of the arrest of Baloch children who have been implicated in false cases.

“The main objective of the meeting was to convey terror threats to the provinces and devise a combined policy which could help in tackling the law and order situation in the country,” he said.

Malik further stand firm on his last warnings regarding massacre in Karachi and said that today’s blast was the first of the warnings that he had given in the past.

“Whenever I had informed regarding any terror threat it had happened,” he said adding that the law enforcement authorities should seriously consider this threat.

The interior minister also announced to confer ‘Sitara-e-Shujaat’ to the bomb disposal squad (BDS) unit which saved life of several people in Sohrab Goth area by the diffusing an active bomb.

The ball bearings on the 11kg improvised device weighed around 3 kg. PHOTOS: RASHID AJMERI/EXPRESS

KARACHI: A major disaster was averted when law enforcement personnel located and then managed to defuse an 11-kilogramme (kg) improvised explosive device (IED) near Cheel Chowk in Lyari on Friday.

According to police officials, the search for the bomb began after Rangers personnel deployed at Cheel Chowk noticed wires lying near their mobile. Bomb disposal squad (BDS) members were called in, and they along with with a team of policemen later searched the area surrounding Cheel Chowk, and ended up finding the wires coming from a concrete block placed alongside the footpath outside a nearby shop.

BDS experts said the 11-kg bomb was made locally. They added that seven kg of the bomb comprised explosive material, while the remaining was made up of ball bearings, nuts and bolts, blades and seven batteries.

A senior BDS expert told The Express Tribune that the device was remote-controlled, and it had a circuit and a detonator attached with it. The whole package was packed inside a cement block.

“All the ball bearings were located on one side of the bomb. If it had exploded, these ball bearings would have caused massive damages on this side,” observed the official.

BDS experts claimed that a similar IED bomb was found in North Nazimabad some time ago. The North Nazimabad bomb had nine batteries attached to it.

Panic gripped the area and residents and shopkeepers were evacuated before the bomb disposal squad defused the device. The police believed that a major tragedy was averted as the bomb was placed near LPG shops.

Lyari SP Sarfaraz Nawaz said that they could not point out which militant group was behind the foiled attempt. However, he observed that the Rangers might be a probable target. “Or it might just be that the culprits wanted to create panic in the area,” said Nawaz.

The officer said that a case has been registered against unidentified persons under the Anti Terrorism Act and the Explosives Act, and further investigation was underway.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 22^nd, 2012.

The bodies were later shifted to the Civil Hospital Karachi.

“The bodies have been identified as those of Munawwar Baloch alias Pathan, Shahid Baloch alias KK, Babar and Qadir. They lived in Pak Colony and had a history of crime,” said Inspector Abdul Wahid Awan, the SHO Pak Colony police station.

“Initial findings suggest all of them left home after sunset on Friday evening after receiving phone calls. The victims were hit by multiple bullets and at least two bodies also carried torture marks,” he said.

Majority of residents of the area were unaware of the bloody episode that took place in the dark of the night but as soon it became known early in the morning on Saturday all commercial activities and daily life came to a halt in the densely-populated neighbourhood. Shops remained closed and transport stayed off the roads till evening.

The investigators found no other motive for the murders but criminal gangs’ bloody warfare going on for almost a decade in Lyari and its adjoining old city areas.

Though unaware of the exact reasons that led to killings of the four youngsters, they said the victims themselves were not known for good reasons. “They were associated with a criminal gang that dealt in drugs, kidnapping and arms,” said SP Akram Abro of Site Town.

“Munawwar was brother of Anwar alias Kojack, ringleader of a gang. The murders appeared to be a result of inter-gang rivalry.

At this moment, investigations are at very early stage but initial findings suggest they were called to resolve a lingering dispute but somehow the meeting turned ugly and ended up in their deaths,” he added

Last year, only more than 2,000 people were killed across Karachi, the documentary claims. It adds that around five people are brutally murdered every day on the streets of Karachi. The newspapers too are rife with news of kidnappings, target killings and torture.

Throughout the documentary, Kemp presents an analysis on the burgeoning gangs in Lyari and the ineffectiveness of law enforcement agencies in curbing the prevailing law and order situation in the metropolis.

‘One police officer for 2,000 people’

According to statistics quoted by Kemp in the documentary, there is just one police officer for every 2,000 people in Karachi. Unsurprisingly, the police find it impossible to curb crime in the city since their weapons are obsolete even as their opponents, the criminals, are equipped with the most sophisticated weaponry.

Kemp points out that almost all all police units are under-staffed and under-paid apart from being a target of criminals with 53 being killed for thier work.

To make matters worse, conviction rate of those arrested is very low due to bureaucracy and corruption in the justice system, allowing many criminals, who were nabbed by law enforcement agencies, quickly finding themselves back on the streets.

There were more than 100 kidnapping cases in the city last year, with the Taliban too having been allegedly involved in some of the incidents, presumably to fund their campaign in Afghanistan.

Meanwhile, some local gangs too were allegedly involved in kidnapping incidents, the documentary claims.

‘Lyari – a no-go area for police’

Lyari has been a major failing for law enforcing agencies for years. The documentary picks up on the thread that the Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) controls the whole of Karachi, except for the area of Lyari.

Uzair Baloch, the “don” of Lyari (wanted for 25 murders by the police) roams carefree between the impoverished Baloch of the area who praise him for being a savior of their community.

Those inhabiting the narrow streets of Lyari pledge their allegiance to the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP), and the area has allegedly become no-go for law enforcement agencies.

“No matter how brave they are, there is one part of Karachi which the police are afraid to tread in,” says Kemp, pointing fingers towards Lyari.

The documentary captures on camera how Lyari gangsters use children and women as human shields. Equipped with sophisticated weapons, the gangsters holed up in this area of Karachi indulge in tit-for-tat killings to settle scores against rivals, the documentary says.

“We Baloch do not forgive murder, we have a system. The revenge for blood is blood,” says Baloch.

He said the deceased lived at Jumma Baloch Road, New Kalri, Lyari.

KRC spokesman Sultan Mandhro informed our sources that Younis was the younger brother of the Katchi Memon Community president and in-charge of a KRC joint unit. He said the victim had some disputes and that police suspected that some Lyari gangsters were behind the killing.

After the incident, residents of Agra Taj and neighbouring areas took to streets and held a sit-in to protest the killing. They kept Maripur Road blocked for at least 24 hours.

The protesters burnt tyres to express their anger, which blocked traffic in the area, while commuters remained stuck in the traffic jam for hours. Some large vehicles remained stranded for at least twenty-four hours. Some transporters said armed men robbed them during the massive traffic jam. A large number of people going to Hawks Bay and other beaches also faced consequences of traffic jam. The protesters demanded arrest of those involved in the murder.

Meanwhile, the KRC announced to end the protest after getting assurance from police authorities that the accused would be brought to justice as early as possible. It is pertinent to mention that police disappeared form the scene during the protest.

In a separate incident, the owner of a milk shop was gunned down in the Usmanabad area, within the vicinity of Garden police station. Officials said the victim, Qasim, 35, son of Ghulam Sarwar, was sitting in his milk shop when armed men opened indiscriminate fire on him. Qasim received multiple bullets and died on the spot. The body was shifted to the CHK for medico-legal formalities.

In another incident, police found body of a young man from the Siddiq Wahab Road area, within the limits of Garden police station. The body was taken to the CHK, where the deceased was identified as Akhtar, 32, son of Ghulam Rasool. Police officials said the deceased was the brother-in-law of the slain Lyari gangster Rehman Dakait’s closed aide Nazeer Bala. Nazeer and two more of his companions and Rehman Dakait were killed in an alleged encounter on August 2009.

As Akhtar’s body reached Lyari, a number of people gathered near Cheel Chowk and staged a protest against his murder. They urged the law enforcement agencies to arrest the culprits. The protesters also set tyres on fire and blocked the road.

A handcuffed 14-days-old decomposed body of a man was recovered from Lyari Naddi within the jurisdiction of Pak Colony police station. Police said that locals of the area informed them that a body stuffed in a bag was lying on the bank of Lyari Naddi.

Police shifted the body to the CHK for an autopsy. The body was at least 14 days old and its identity was yet to be ascertained, police said, adding that it had been moved to a morgue for identification.

A tortured body of a eunuch was found near Sohrab Goth Bridge within the limits of Sohrab Goth police station.

Suicide attacks were peaking, a severe power crisis had crippled daily life, the economy had begun to dip, a judicial crisis was forming: if it can ever truly be said that control had been lost of a time and space, those were the days.

Mehrullah was pacing around on his own little island of discontent. The featherweight, pound for pound the best boxer in Pakistan, had been banned for life by the Pakistan Boxing Federation (PBF) after testing positive for cannabis use months before.

He did not look particularly put out, even though he would miss the 2008 Beijing Olympics. He was appealing against the ban and made the right kind of protestations, but it just felt like this was not the worst thing that had happened to him.

In that vague and informal, half-said, half-implied and fully contradictory conversational style of so many subcontinental sportsmen, unbuffered to media, he all but admitted something.

“You know how we come and go in Lyari,” he began of the Karachi locality he was from. “It’s normal here but it’s normal everywhere, it happens. Across the world it happens. My performance doesn’t improve because of it; it’s not steroids. We were clear when fighting here. Guys who take drugs lose, they don’t win.”

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Lyari is a little planet inside Karachi. It is possible to live an entire life in the city and never come across Lyari, especially if newspapers and TV channels are your thing.

They will tell you it is a forbidding place, violent and ghettoised, run by gangs run by political parties. Neighbourhoods are called Baghdadi or Cheel Chowk (Kite Roundabout); lost tales of legendary crime dons slink through gambling – or rummy – clubs looking to be found.

Episodically, areas of Lyari do undergo sieges, of the making of its gangs or by the state, and it can get so that it feels like the area is retching to try to expunge something from within itself.

Just last month, for example, the police and security forces entered Lyari to rid it of crime syndicates. An eight-day battle left approximately 25 dead and nobody any the wiser why.

But most days Lyari has the kind of alluring lived-in, used-up authenticity that a city’s older settlements have, a back story you need to know. It also invests itself in sport in a way few other localities in Karachi do. Not cricket, but real sport, residents will tell you, like football (the Pakistani Pele, Abdul Ghafoor is from there), cycling and, of course, boxing.

Mehrullah has lived his entire life in Lyari. When I met him that day in 2007, he’d had enough.

“I will have to leave it because the situation is pretty bad at the moment with gangs roaming around. My younger brother Sherullah got shot but he is OK now.”

When we met again during the recent troubles, a year retired from boxing, now husband and a father, he has changed his mind.

“We have choices outside Lyari but I’m not feeling it there. I was sitting happily at home” during the police operation. “We neither owe anyone, nor does anyone owe us. I can leave but our area was clear. Until I hear firing at night I don’t sleep anyway. The family is happy, what more do I want?”

In a way, boxing is Lyari’s response to its own shifting relevance within the city. It houses the country’s best boxing clubs and has produced the finest boxers, including Hussain Shah, who won the middleweight bronze at the Seoul Olympics in 1988. That remains Pakistan’s only Olympic medal other than for hockey.

One of six sons, Mehrullah began boxing at the famous Kakri Club when he was 10, the sport passed down to him like a damaged family heirloom.

“My uncle and his kids used to box, so I started from watching them. My parents didn’t want it but uncle came and convinced them.”

Within five years, he had been inducted by Karachi Port Trust (KPT), the government port authority with a long history of patronage of sports, particularly less-popular ones such as boxing. Predominantly, employment with a private or state-owned body is how most Pakistani sportsmen are sustained.

“He was small and quick,” was the assessment of one of Mehrullah’s first – and best-nicknamed – mentors, “Tiger” Mohammad Ali. “But mostly he was cunning in that he was seriously determined about not getting hit.”

Once in the system, a succession of coaches from Cuba shaped him into a featherweight. Briefly, once he achieved his ambition in 1998 of “boxing for Pakistan” (he lost his first match) he was almost lost to the game. He failed to qualify for the Sydney Olympics and though continued training, he began to look at other ways to survive.

In 2000, he began selling chole, a spicy chickpea dish, from a roadside stall.

“After our morning training, the whole day was free till training in evening, so something needed to be done. A friend said let’s sell haleem”, a pasty, spicy mixture of grains and meat, “and I said no, chole will sell more.”

It went well for six months or so, but once he was selected for a training camp in Kazakhstan, after a number of first-choice boxers left disgruntled, he knew what he wanted. “I got up immediately and said ‘Let’s parcel all of this, I need to go.’ I gave it all away to neighbours and went to train.”

Until the ban six years later, Mehrullah came close to becoming Pakistan’s best boxer ever and, at his weight, one of the best in Asia. He won gold at the Asian Games in 2002 in Busan, South Korea. At the Asian Amateur Boxing Championships in 2005 he won gold again.

At the Melbourne Commonwealth Games in 2006, he won silver. He qualified for the 2004 Athens Olympic in first place from Asia and though he was eliminated early, it was at bantamweight and to the eventual gold medallist, the Cuban Guillermo Rigondeaux.

But Beijing was the one he really wanted.

“That ban really hurt because it came during my peak,” he remembered. “International authorities banned me for six months, but the PBF first did it for life, then two years. Why? It’s obvious: here a hundred guys pull you down and only a few pull you up.”

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The ban was lifted in 2008, but after Beijing. Mehrullah returned but never was as sharp. London 2012 was a target but last year, after a middling few years, at 32 he decided to quit. He now works at KPT as a traffic supervisor, content.

“I work from eight in the morning and I have a good post. I have my own office.” He laughs at how KPT kept him on daily wages and didn’t make him a permanent employee until 2002, when he won gold at the Asiad. And they did so only because Mehrullah had the good sense to ask the president, Musharraf, to resolve the matter.

“I was told to say nothing to him at a function arranged for us, but when he asked me do I need anything, how could I not ask him to sort this? He was the president!” The president – and prime minister – also gave him cash rewards of Rs6 million (Dh239,000), securing his future.

But as he faded, so too began unravelling the fragile thread of recognition and financial support on which Pakistan boxing was always balanced, tipping this way and that but never falling.

Mehrullah’s peak capped off a golden age; in seven Asiads up to and including 2002, Pakistan won 40 medals in boxing. They have not won a medal since. Not one qualified for Beijing or London 2012.

Given the sport and the country, it is no surprise to find much administrative malpractice behind this. The PBF president, Doda Khan Bhutto, is feuding with the secretary, Akram Khan. It is undignified stuff, accusations of corruption and human trafficking traded.

That side of it has never been clean; the late Anwar Chowdhry, the father of Pakistan boxing and a long-time Amateur International Boxing Association (AIBA) president (and creator of the modern point-scoring system) gave much to it, but took back equally.

But then, as Mehrullah acknowledged, someone cared.

“I miss it now, but the way boxing is going, my heart has gone,” he said. “There aren’t any good boxers and even if there are, they won’t be able to get ahead.”

Bureaucracy remains a formidable opponent. Though he has been made permanent at KPT, nine years on, he still has not received the letter confirming it.

“I will go to the chairman, I will wear a blazer when I go and will ask him for it,” he said. And he will go mostly happy. “Could I have done more? Yeah … maybe the Olympics. That was an obsession.”

osamiuddin@thenational.ae

KARACHI: Ten more people, including a policeman, were killed in incidents of targeted violence in various parts of the city on Friday. Four of the killings took place in the Garden area.Taking notice of the four killings in the area, the Senior Superintendent of Police (SSP), Asif Ijaz Sheikh, suspended the SHO of Garden police station, Syed Mutahir Hussain.Sources said Ayub Baloch and Nadeem Baloch came under attack near the Fawara Chowk in Garden. Police reached the crime scene and shifted the two injured to Civil Hospital where during treatment Ayub Baloch died while his friend Nadeem survived.

During investigation, it was found that Ayub and Nadeem were relatives who had come to Karachi from Balochistan on Friday morning. Ayub was suffering from a disease and had come to Karachi for treatment.

On Friday afternoon, when Ayub and Nadeem were about to leave for hospital, two armed men riding a motorcycle appeared, opened fire on them and fled. Police found empty shells of a 9mm pistol from the spot which were sent to the Sindh Police Lab for forensic test. The murder seems to be a part of target killings.

As the Garden police were busy in legal formalities, they received information that a body was lying near the Shama Palace. The police rushed to the spot where they found a young boy lying dead. They shifted the body to the CHK.

It was found that the deceased was kidnapped from an unknown place by unidentified people who tortured the boy, shot him dead and threw the body in the area.In yet another targeted attack, Raziq Baloch was shot in the Garden area on Friday morning. The incident happened in Hassan Lashkeri village in Garden. The police shifted the injured to the CHK where he died during treatment.

Meanwhile, Raziq Baloch, a resident of the same area, was sitting outside his home reading a newspaper on Friday morning when two armed men on a motorcycle came, opened fire on him and fled. The SHO said the deceased was the owner of a video game shop. He had no political affiliation.

In the evening, a body was found in the Garden area of Pak Colony police remits. The body was retrieved from a spot near the Lyari Naddi, Dhobi Ghat, and sent to the CHK for post-mortem. During search, police found some Indian currency and a mobile SIM. The deceased appeared to be a Bengali.

Meanwhile, in the Kalakot police remits, unidentified armed men killed Abbas Ali Zaidi and injured Sagheer. The incident happened late on Thursday night near the Tanga Stand in Lyari.

SHO Chand Khan Niazi of Kalakot police station said that deceased Abbas Ali and injured Sagheer were senior employees of the Lyari Division of Pakistan Telecommunication Company Limited (PTCL).

They were attacked by unidentified men when they were on their way home from office on Thursday night. The deceased was a resident of the Jaffar-e-Tayyar Society.

Head Constable Abdul Qayyum was shot dead outside his house in Pathan Colony of Site area late on Thursday night. One of his neighbours, Umer Bahadur, was injured in the same incident.

Police said that the deceased head constable was posted at the Site-A police station and was actively pursuing criminal elements. It seemed that the same criminal elements had targeted him. Qayyum was married and hailed from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

In yet another case, Daud Ahmed Magsi was shot dead in the PIB Colony police limits. The incident happened on Friday morning in Baloch Para of the PIB Colony. Acting on a tip-off, police reached the scene where they were informed that the victim was taken to the Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre (JPMC) where he died during treatment.

During investigation, it was found that Daud Ahmed Magsi was sitting outside his home when two armed men riding a motorcycle came, opened fire on him and fled. Investigators said that the deceased was the maternal uncle of Ahmed Ali Magsi of the Lyari gang war. A few months ago, unidentified armed men had torched his house and shops over some dispute.

Police said that the murder seemed to be a part of targeted killings.Soon after the killing, tension gripped the area where unidentified men resorted to aerial firing and forced closure of shops.

Another victim of the day, Shujaat, was shot dead in Bijli Nagar, Mominabad, on Friday morning, police said.The deceased, a security guard at a local shop, was performing his duty when two armed men riding a motorcycle opened fire on him. As a result, Shujaat breathed his last on the spot. The deceased hailed from Matta in Swat. He left behind a widow and two children.

Police said the deceased was a supporter of a religious group. They termed the murder of Shujaat a part of target killings. In yet another case, Mirza Adeel Baig was shot dead in Awami Colony, Korangi No 6.

Sub-Divisional Police Officer (SDPO) of Landhi Division, Abdul Majeed Abbas, said that the incident happened on Friday evening.During investigation, it was found that Adeel was a resident of Korangi and worked for a private firm.

Two unidentified armed men had opened fire on him in Awami Colony, killing him on the spot. Police said that the deceased was a supporter of a political party and termed the murder of Mirza Adeel as part of target killings.

Meanwhile, Umair was shot dead in Sharafi Goth police limits.SHO Ijaz Khokhar of Sharafi Goth police station said that the incident happened in Manshera Colony. The deceased was a resident of the same area. The police cordoned off the crime scene and sent another party to the JPMC where the police were informed that Umair had succumbed to his injuries.

Investigators said that it was not yet clear whether the deceased was killed by motorcycle riders or someone from within the area.

The deceased had no political affiliations, the investigators said.Meanwhile, four people were injured late on Friday night in a targeted attack near the Sui Sothern Gas Company head office in Aziz Bhatti police limits.

Police said the victims were standing at a bus stop when two armed men riding a motorcycle appeared and opened fire on them.

The injured were identified as Abdul Hadi, Zahid, Imran Sheraz and Naveed. The condition of all the injured is stated to be out of danger.

Source: http://www.thenews.com.pk/Todays-News-13-15386-10-more-killed-in-Karachi-violence

A firing incident took place at Khushaal Chowk in the Machar Colony. Unidentified men opened fire on a motorcyclist and fled.  The deceased was identified as Abdus Sattar.

Both bodies were shifted to Civil Hospital for further police investigations.

According to police sources, the city’s Motorway Police, after seizing two hand grenades from Lyari Expressway, blocked the thoroughfare for traffic for fear of more explosive devices that could have been planted somewhere.

The two bombs remained on the track untouched for some time meanwhile the bomb disposal squad neutralized the grenades, the police source said.
Ends-SANA-AA-ZS

http://www.sananews.net/english/two-hand-grenades-found-from-lyari-expressway/

Scared and frustrated, the residents of Lyari have begun to move to other areas when the operation started. PHOTO: PPI

Advocate Salahuddin Gandapur had submitted in his petition that the operation was launched with mala fide intention and thousands of people were held hostage by the Crime Investigation Department (CID) officers for almost a week.

On Friday, the petitioner submitted that dozens of people were killed and many went missing during the unsuccessful operation in one of the oldest localities of the city.

Gandapur requested the court to order the government to pay compensation to the heirs of those killed in the operation and to the owners of houses burnt or damaged.

Justices Faisal Arab and Nadeem Akhtar asked him to file a list of people who went missing during the week-long operation. The petitioner claimed that the operation violated the fundamental human rights of the citizens of Lyari.

The houses of hundreds of people were damaged or burnt by the CID police officials, he said. As rations were exhausted, babies kept crying for milk but the people could not go out due to the constant gunfire, Gandapur added.

After hearing the petitioner in person, the bench directed the Sindh government and the police chief to give their response on the petition within two weeks. The court adjourned to an unspecified date.

Published in The Express Tribune, May 26^th, 2012.