Pakistani Religious Leader Among Six Dead In Shooting
KARACHI, May 18 (News Agencies) - Police fired tear gas to control angry protesters after a prominent religious party leader was among six people gunned down here Friday in an attack, police said.
Unidentified gunmen intercepted Saleem Qadri, president of the Muslim Sunni Tehreek (Sunni Movement), soon after he left his home in Baldia neighborhood with other party men and family members to offer Friday prayers.
They sprayed bullets at his car, killing Qadri and his two nephews on the spot, city police chief Tariq Jameel said.
Two of his associates, including a cousin, died later in hospital, while Qadri's two sons were in serious conditions with bullet wounds, police said. A police officer assigned to guard Qadri was also killed.
"It is definitely an act of terrorism," Jameel said without blaming any group.
Paramilitary troops were deployed and police resorted to tear gas as up to 200 angry party supporters gathered outside this southern port city's Civil Hospital, where the victims' bodies were taken after the shooting.
Jameel said security had been tightened to prevent unrest and revenge attacks, but police were unable to stop the mob from torching cars and blocking roads with burning tires outside the hospital.
Police said Qadri's murder could be linked to his group's differences with other Sunni organizations, especially those from the Deobandi school.
Sunni Tehreek, founded by Qadri in the early 1990s, represents followers of the majority Barelvi school of Pakistan's dominant Sunni community.
Qadri survived a similar assassination attempt in the eastern city of Lahore in 1996.
Sectarian violence involving Sunnis and their counterparts in the minority Shiite community has claimed dozens of lives in Pakistan this year.
But intense rivalries between various schools of the Sunni community are also another source of religious violence in the country.
