WASHINGTON DC (TIP): The Free Karachi Campaign has launched its next phase in the U.S.A. with billboards advertisements. As part of the campaign, “#FreeKarachi and Urban Sindh from State Atrocities in Pakistan” advertisements have appeared on several highway billboards in the U.S. West Coast city of Los Angeles.

The Free Karachi Campaign had started on 15 January in the U.S. capital Washington, D.C. when a number of taxis and cars with #FreeKarachi banners participated in the city’s annual Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Day parade.

The Washington Post, one of the most prominent newspapers of the U.S., had also published a special supplement that had carried details of the injustices that Sindh Province’s people, Urdu-speaking Mohajirs in particular, have been facing in Pakistan. A digital advertisement of Free Karachi is still running on the official website of the Washington Times.

Commenting on the latest phase of the campaign, Free Karachi spokesperson Nadeem Nusrat said that “Karachi is Pakistan’s most secular city where religious extremists have always failed to develop a stronghold. Pakistan’s Punjabi-dominated deep-state, however, is trying to change this great, tolerant trait of this city by promoting forces of religious extremism.”

“While Dr. Shakil Afridi languishes in prison and thousands of Mohajirs and Balochs gone missing after being taken into custody by Pakistani security forces, the UNO and U.S.-designated terrorists are allowed to hold rallies in Karachi. This clearly proves why Free Karachi is necessary”, added Mr. Nusrat.

“The taxes paid by Karachi and other areas of urban Sindh run Pakistan’s economy. Karachi alone pays over 90 percent taxes for the treasury of Sindh Province, but it has no representation in the federal as well as the provincial governments. Karachi is ranked by most independent organizations as the second most populace city in the world, but its population is always reduced in the official census figures by both Larkana-based Sindh and Islamabad-based federal government,’ said Mr. Nusrat.

Criticizing Pakistani judiciary, Mr. Nusrat said that “while Pakistani supreme courts are known for taking suo-moto action over petty issues, they have failed to take notice of the brutal murder of Harvard-educated, elderly Professor Hasan-Zafar Arif who was abducted and killed recently in Karachi.”

“Mohajirs –those whose ancestors had migrated from India to Pakistan in 1947 – are the ones whose forefathers not only made Pakistan a reality but also played a key role in sustaining Pakistan in its most turbulent times. These Mohajirs have now been barred from governments jobs and security institutions. Their young generation is blatantly admission in public-funded professional educational institutions and government jobs. As recently as last week, over one thousand Karachi students were denied admission at Karachi University and the seats were instead given to students from rural Sindh.” Mr. Nusrat continued.

“It is not possible for Mohajirs to raise their voice against state-sponsored injustices in Pakistan. Political offices of Mohajirs’ mainstream political party, MQM, have been illegally demolished in Pakistan and the party is facing an illegal, unannounced ban. The Mohajirs living overseas now have to highlight the brutal and undemocratic policies of Pakistani State at every possible international forum,” Mr. Nusrat added.