Defence Minister Khawaja Asif earlier yesterday blasted away at Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) for over reacting about the Rangers pre-dawn Thursday’s raid on their headquarter ‘Nine Zero’ in Karachi.
“It was only few days back (when) the MQM was inviting martial law … now that the writ of the law is being restored in Karachi…. (Why is) MQM complaining (about it now),” the minister said in a post that appeared on his Twitter account.
Asif’s admonition came within an hour after an unforgiving Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan had also expressed similar sentiments at the MQM and asked them “to tone down” their derogative rhetoric against the paramilitary troops of Pakistan.
Nisar said, “They have crossed all the lines in denouncing the sentinels of the state. Does any country in the world allow its servicemen to be treated like this?”
The minister for defence, towing the line of his counterpart for the interior, saluted the troops for laying their lives on the line so that the rest of the countrymen could live in peace.
“Rangers and Army are fighting the war of our existence… without peace in Karachi peace in rest of the country will remain elusive,” Asif said in another tweet.
In his last tweet, Asif vowed that Karachi, being Pakistan’s economic lifeline, would be protected at all costs – if Allah Almighty is willing.
Rangers’ personnel wearing black masks busted ‘Nine Zero’ in the wee hours of Wednesday, seizing a “huge quantity” of weapons and arresting activists, including one accused of murdering a journalist.