Law and Order URC NEWSCLIPPINGS JANUARY TO JUNE 2019 LAW & ORDERS Urban Resource Centre A-2, 2nd floor, Westland Trade Centre, Block 7&8, C-5, Shaheed-e-Millat Road, Karachi. Tel: 021-4559317, Fax: 021-4387692, Email: [email protected], Website: www.urckarachi.org Facebook: www.facebook.com/URCKHI Twitter: https://twitter.com/urc_karachi 1 Law and Order URC Targeted killing: KMC employee shot dead in Hussainabad Unidentified assailants shot and killed an employee of the Karachi Metropolitan Corporation (KMC) at Hussainabad locality of Federal B Area in Central district on Monday. The deceased was struck by seven bullets in different parts of the body. Nine bullet shells of a 9mm pistol were recovered from the scene of the crime. According to police, the deceased was called to the location through a phone call. They said the late KMC employee was on his motorcycle waiting for someone. Two unidentified men killed him by opening fire at him at Hussainabad, near Okhai Memon Masjid, in the limits of Azizabad police station. The deceased, identified as Shakeel Ahmed, aged 35, son of Shafiq Ahmed, was shifted to Abbasi Shaheed Hospital for medico-legal formalities. He was a resident of house no. L-72 Sector 5C 4, North Karachi, and worked as a clerk in KMC‘s engineering department. Rangers and police officials reached the scene after receiving information of the incident. They recovered nine bullet shells of a 9mm pistol and have begun investigating the incident. According to Azizabad DSP Shaukat Raza, someone had phoned and summoned the deceased to Hussainabad, near Okhai Memon Masjid. The DSP said Shakeel was sitting on his motorcycle without his helmet and was waiting for someone when two armed men on a motorcycle came from the opposite direction, opened fire on him and escaped the scene. The DSP termed it as an incident of target killing but said the police is investigating the case from various angles. The SHO said that the deceased was shot seven times on different parts of the body including head, arm, and back. Central SSP Arif Aslam Rao said that two bullets in critical parts of the body became the cause of death. The actual number of bullets will be determined after the post-mortem. The SSP said political or religious affiliations of the deceased have not been determined as yet and no political or religious party has so far owned him as their worker. No criminal record of the deceased has been found, he said. The police is approaching the case as a target killing, a case of personal rivalry and from other angles. The CCTV footage from nearby cameras is also being retrieved, he said. Separately, the body of a man was found from a warehouse near Madina Hotel MPR Colony Mujeeb Goth, in the area of Orangi Town police station. The deceased had a head wound . The police reached the scene on receiving information, took the body in custody and shifted it to Abbasi Shaheed Hospital for medico-legal formalities. The deceased was identified as Ayaz Khan, aged 35, son of Khan Muhammad. He was a resident of MPR Colony. Orangi Town SHO Muhammad Basheer said that the deceased fell from the roof top of the warehouse and the accident resulted in his death. The police has handed over the body to the family after investigation. In another incident, Hazrat Ameen, aged 50, was injured when unidentified armed men opened fire at him near Shabbir Eye Hospital Masjid Darul Islam Metro Ville Sector 3 in the limits of SITE A police station. He was immediately taken to Abbasi Shaheed Hospital. According to police, the incident was the result of a personal rivalry. (By Our Correspondent The Express Tribune, 04, 01/01/2019) Karachi Operation report: 2018 records highest number of Rangers operations Since the Karachi operation, jointly conducted by the Sindh Rangers and the police, began in September 2013, the law and order situation in the port city has considerably improved, claims a progress report submitted by the Sindh Rangers. According to the report, most of the operations, in the span of five years and four months, were conducted in 2018. In the ye ar 2013, the report records 57 incidents of terrorism. It increased to 66 in 2014 and 199 in 2015. The number of incidents decreased to 16 in 2016 and finally zero in 2017. Two incidents were recorded in 2018, however. The incidents of target killings saw a steep decline. In the first year of the operation, 965 incidents were recorded. It dec reased to 602 in 2014, 199 in 2015, 89 in 2016, 45 in 2017 and nine in 2018. Similarly, cases of extortion also declined. A total of 1,524 cases were recorded in 2013, which decreased to 899 in 2014, 303 in 2015, 101 in 2016, 65 in 2017, and 51 in 2018. Incidents of kidnapping decreased from 174 in 2013 to 115 in 2014, 37 in 2015, 26 in 2016, 18 in 2017 and 13 in 2018. The report further states that Sindh Rangers seized 13,224 weapons and 876,083 bullets of different weapons. These include 7 RPG rocket launchers, 139 heavy and light machine guns, 1,431 Kalashnikovs and sub-machine guns, 662 short guns, 977 repeaters, 1,584 rifles, 8,378 pistols and revolvers. In all, 15,838 operations were conducted. A total of 11,619 terrorists and other criminals were handed over to the police and 2,210 terrorists, 1,881 target killers, 852 extortionists and 227 kidnappers were arrested. A total of 169 kidnapped people were also successfully recovered. The operations were not without casualties, 28 Rangers were martyred in the line of duty and 100 others injured. In 2018 alone, four Sindh Rangers were martyred. (By Our Correspondent The Express Tribune, 04, 01/01/2019) Rao Anwar retires from police Recalcitrant police officer Rao Anwar Ahmed retired from police service while being suspended and facing trial for killing four men, including South Waziristan youngster Naqeebullah Mehsud, in a fake encounter last year, official sources said on Tuesday. 2 Law and Order URC They said that the 30-year-long career of Rao Anwar, who had been enlarged on bail in the Naqeeb murder case, in police ended as he attained the age of superannuation. He joined police in 1982 as an assistant sub-inspector and rose to the rank of SSP. Most years of his service remained controversial because of his involvement in various ―encounters,‖ they added. As the SSP-Malir, Rao Anwar along with DSP Qamar Ahmed Shaikh and several other officials was booked for killing four men, including Naqeeb, in a fake encounter in Shah Latif Town on Jan 13, 2018. He was also booked for foisting fake recoveries of illicit arms and explosives on the victims. After protest by the civil society and anger over social media, the Supreme Court took suo motu notice and ordered his arrest. Furthermore, protests staged by the Mehsud tribe and the Pashtun Tahaffuz Movement (PTM) lent impetus to the call for justice for Naqeeb. He went into hiding soon after demands for his arrest in the Naqeeb murder case gained traction after it came to light that the victim had been a shopkeeper and aspiring model from Waziristan who had settled in Karachi. He was then arrested in March 2018 when he finally appeared before the Supreme Court after eluding law enforcement agencies for over a month. After spending more than three months in prison, an Anti-Terrorism Court granted him bail which led to his release. (By The Newspaper's Staff Reporter Dawn, 15, 02/01/2019) No significant decline in kidnappings seen in Karachi in 2018 As many as 38 persons were kidnapped for ransom in Sindh in 2018, according to a crime data report issued by the provincial police on Monday. In the year 2017, a total of 46 persons had been kidnapped for ransom in different districts of Sindh. The police report revealed that in 2017 only three incidents of terrorism had been reported in the province while in 2018 four terrorism incidents took place. In 2017, a total of 23 people fell victim to targeted killing while in 2018 year only nine people were murdered in targeted attacks. In the year 2017 as many as 1,520 people were murdered on account of various reasons across the Sindh province while in 2018, a total of 1,298 people were killed. Lyari gangster Ghaffar Zikri and kidnapper Mashooq Nadwani were gunned down As many as nine bank robbery incidents took place in the year 2017 while in 2018 only three bank robberies took place in the province. 1,182 ‘encounters’ The Sindh police data showed that a total of 1,182 ‗encounters‘ took place in the year 2018 in which four alleged terrorists and 81 dacoits were killed in various parts of the province. During these encounters, 661 ‗gangs‘ were busted while 2,206 suspects were arrested red-handed. In one of the encounters ‗notorious gangster‘ of Lyari Ghaffar Zikri was gunned down. One alleged ‗notorious‘ kidnapper Mashooq Nadwani allegedly involved in kidnapping of a bureaucrat was killed in an encounter in the Benazirabad district. Action against sub-nationalist groups The counter terrorism department of police arrested a suspect, Nadir Bhangwar, in the Benazirabad district. He was an ―activist/mastermind of the banned Jeay Sindh Muttahida Mahaz/Sindh Republican Army which was involved in improvised explosive device blast in Nawabshah city‖. During the year 2018, the police also launched different campaigns in order to maintain law and order and arrested a total of 9,045 proclaimed offenders and 18,709 absconders while a huge quantity of drugs was also seized.