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Nine MQM activists sentenced to death in Pakistan

An anti-terrorist court today sentenced to death nine members of a minority ethnic party for shooting dead a former provincial governor, court officials said.

The nine men are members of the Muttahida Quami Movement (MQM), a political group that represents Indian Muslims who settled in Pakistan after 1947.

The shooting victim, Hakim Said, a former governor of Sindh, was a university chancellor and a loud critic of the MQM.

After his October 17, 1998, shooting, Prime Minister Nawaz Sharief dismissed the Sindh provincial government saying it had lost control of the law-and-order situation and imposed governor's rule, which is still in place.

The MQM has denied involvement in Said's killing and accused Sharief's government of trying to destroy its political power base in the province.

AP

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