KARACHI, 7 October 2003 — Gunmen riding in a Mitsubishi Pajero shot dead extremist-turned-lawmaker Azam Tariq and four other passengers traveling in an official car near Islamabad yesterday.
Tariq, the one-time leader of the outlawed Sunni extremist group Sipah-e-Sahaba and a member of Parliament, was among the dead, Islamabad police chief Mohammed Akram confirmed. Tariq’s personal secretary, Rashid Farooqi, also told reporters at Islamabad’s PIMS hospital, where the bodies were taken, that his employer had died. The other victims were a driver and three bodyguards.
The attack occurred near a toll plaza on the southwestern outskirts of the city. Pakistan’s Geo television showed gruesome images of the victims lying slumped in the bullet-riddled car amid shattered glass.
Nobody immediately claimed responsibility for the attack, but Tariq had many enemies.
He was detained at the start of the US-led military operation in Afghanistan to prevent him from leading pro-Taleban rallies. But he won a seat in Parliament from behind bars in October 2002 and was released shortly afterward when a court in Lahore ruled the government had not produced enough evidence to hold him.
Although Tariq denied supporting armed struggle, Sipah-e-Sahaba was blamed by police for more than 400 killings in sectarian violence in recent years. The group also has strong ties to Afghanistan’s former Taleban leaders.
The group was one of five militant organizations outlawed by President Gen. Pervez Musharraf in January 2002 as he sought to purge the country of extremism and terrorism.
Most of Sipah-e-Sahaba’s victims have been rival Shiites, but attacks on Christians and Western interests have increased since Musharraf joined the US-led war on terror. Tariq formed a new party called Millat-e-Islamia, or Islamic Nation, in April. Several banned Pakistani militant groups have gotten around laws meant to disband them by simply changing their names. Tariq had become a supporter of the government of Prime Minister Zafarullah Khan Jamali.
On Friday, gunmen in Karachi opened fire on a bus carrying Shiites, killing six and wounding several others. Funerals for the victims the next day turned violent, with mourners attacking fast food restaurants, burning cars and damaging two gas stations.
