ISLAMABAD, 25 March 2003 — Some 200 blind Pakistani students staged an anti-war demonstration demanding the safety of Iraqi children yesterday, while lawyers boycotted courts and laborers took to the streets in anti-US demonstrations.

The blind students staged a rally at the Blind Center in Multan, chanting “save Iraqi children” and said they opposed any move to expel Iraqi diplomats from Pakistan.

Lawyers in Multan staged a demonstration of their own to protest the major US bombing campaign in Iraq, denouncing the leaders of Britain and the US as “enemies of peace.”

Elsewhere some 500 university students took part in a procession in Quetta, capital of southwestern Balochistan province.

They blocked the Karachi-Quetta highway for sometime before police persuaded them to lift the siege.

In the southern port city of Karachi, some 150 activists of the Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal (MMA), an alliance of six Islamic parties, gathered outside the local press club and chanted slogans against US President George W. Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair.

“The US has no right to install a government of its choice in Iraq, it is the right of the Iraqi people to choose their government,” speakers said amid chants of “Bush and Blair are terrorist” and “Saddam is Muslim hero.” Journalists in the Pakistani-administered zone of Kashmir also staged an anti-war rally in the state capital Muzaffarabad to express solidarity with the Iraqi people.

“No to War, Yes to Peace,” and “Bombing of innocents cannot bring peace,” read placards carried by the reporters. They called for immediate UN intervention to halt the war.

In Karachi, a group of clerics called for jihad against the United States and its allies because of their attack on Iraq.

Fourteen top clerics, including the prominent pro-Taleban leader, Mufti Nizamuddin Shamzai, did not specify what form this jihad would take, but said it should also target Muslim rulers who sided with Washington.

“Jihad had become mandatory on Muslims since President Bush’s announcement of a crusade” in the wake of Sept. 11, 2001 attacks in the United States, they said in a statement. “The attack on Iraq has intensified this conflict. “Every Muslim should participate in the holy war according to his capacity,” they said.

Pakistan has ruled out expelling Iraqi diplomats despite Washington’s worldwide request to sever diplomatic ties with the present Iraqi government ahead of a promised “regime change.”