Pak orders extra troops as Karachi death toll mounts

KARACHI: Pakistan ordered extra troops into Karachi on Sunday as deadly violence over the suspension of the country's chief justice spilled into a second day, raising the death toll to 37.   

Three people including a policeman were the latest victims as protesters blocked the main highway with burning tyres and pelted vehicles with stones. Karachi police chief Azhar Farooqi described the situation as "very tense".   

"The assailants set his bike on fire and tortured him before shooting him from close range," said police officer Shafiqur Rehman, referring to his dead colleague. Two other men were shot dead in a separate incident.   

Heavy gunfire was also heard in the southern port city's impoverished Banaras Chowk area, where angry protesters beat up four policemen. Police used teargas to clear the roadblock on the main highway.   

The clashes broke out on Saturday between supporters of suspended chief justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry and President Pervez Musharraf, who were due to hold rival mass rallies.   

Gunmen armed with Kalashnikov rifles and pistols roamed the volatile southern port city throughout Saturday, torching vehicles and clashing with supporters of Chaudhry.   

Chaudhry, who has become a focal point for opponents of military ruler Musharraf, was forced to scrap plans to address thousands of people and had to fly back to the capital, Islamabad.   

The president blamed Chaudhry's supporters for politicising the issue.   

"Stop agitation if you are patriots, if you have love for the people and if you have the same pain for the deaths of people in Karachi," Musharraf told thousands of ruling party workers at another rally in Islamabad late Saturday.   

Musharraf removed Chaudhry from his post on March 9 on charges including that he obtained promotions for his son, sparking two months of protests by lawyers and opposition secular and hardline Islamic parties.   

After several rallies were teargassed in March, the judge's supporters were relatively quiet until he was greeted by tens of thousands of people last weekend in the eastern city of Lahore.   

Pro-Musharraf parties responded Saturday by calling a counter-demonstration in Karachi to coincide with Chaudhry's speech and blocking his route from the airport.   

Fierce gunbattles erupted in several areas, including near the airport, leaving at least 34 people dead and more than 100 injured, while activists torched dozens of vehicles.    

Officials said most of the dead were from the Pakistan People's Party of exiled former premier Benazir Bhutto and also included a policeman and a paramedic.   

Private Aaj television, which has come under pressure from the government for its allegedly pro-chief justice stance, showed footage of gunmen firing at its office in Karachi and of its correspondents diving for cover.   

New York-based Human Rights Watch said Musharraf's government and its allies had apparently "deliberately sought to foment violence in Karachi," adding that police stood by as "silent spectators".   

One opposition party has called a strike on Monday, when Chaudhry is due to attend the latest in a series of Supreme Court hearings into the legality of the charges against him, which he denies. 
 Opponents say army chief Musharraf sacked the independent-minded Chaudhry unconstitutionally in a bid to hobble the judiciary and make it easier to be re-elected as president by the current parliament before his five-year term runs out in November.   

Elections are also expected late this year or early next.