SHAFAQNA PAKISTAN (Shia News Agency)
MQM’s supremo who has been in UK for more than two decades is indeed between rock and hard place because his party is not only facing charges of terrorism in Pakistan he himself is facing money laundering case and Imran Farooq’s murder case. Especially after new that Pakistan has handed over key evidences in Imran Farooq’s murder case and links of Altaf Hussain with his murder. Only lawyers can comment on the legal aspects of the videotaped ‘dying declaration’ of MQM murder convict Saulat Mirza, whose statement seems to have earned him at least a temporary reprieve from the hangman’s noose. Mirza’s sensational revelations, which have sent convulsions through Pakistan’s fourth largest political party, were followed by the announcement that his execution had been stayed for 72 hours. Saulat Mirza had already articulated the substance of his ‘confession’ in a statement before a Joint Investigation Team some years ago, the video of which is in the public domain. Last week’s raid on Nine Zero and recent allegations by the Rangers of MQM’s culpability in the deadly Baldia fire have unfolded against rising tensions between the law-enforcement agency and the party, which maintains it is being unfairly singled out in the ongoing counterterrorism operations in Karachi.
However, the latest development raises several questions: how did a camera find its way into the death cell? Why this modus operandi, especially when there are other ways of going after militants taking refuge? Why now? What is the long-term objective? The MQM leader may be a lot of things but, seriously, do Saulat Mirza ‘de-briefers’ want us to believe Altaf Hussain is so without sense that he’d order a murder over an open phone line? What is a mere improbability to unbiased commentators will seem like outright persecution to the loyal supporters. It is time for both MQM and LEAs to come to a solution to the problem. MQM needs to reinvent itself while LEAs need to shun enmity against MQM.
pakistan.shafaqna.com
