ISLAMABAD
Pakistan's army are conducting an onslaught against Taliban militants in their northwestern North Waziristan stronghold but, it seems, the battle has not been limited to Pakistan's tribal regions. In Karachi, the country's largest city, the security forces have been accused of adopting an "arrest and shoot" policy against the militants.
In the last week, nine suspected Taliban militants have been killed in so-called "encounters" in the southern port city, where many Taliban fighters take cover in shanty towns. All nine militants, according to police, were killed after heavy exchanges of fire, but local media have cast doubts over the circumstances, highlighting that no policemen were hurt in any of the three incidents.
The most recent encounter in a western Karachi district supposedly saw militants throw a bomb and fire on a patrolling vehicle. Still, no police officer was injured.
The notorious "fake encounter" -- when police stage scenarios to justify extrajudicial killings -- is a thorny issue. The Muttehida Quami Movement, a political party that dominates Karachi and is itself accused of violence and intimidation, has claimed to have been targeted by such incidents.
The group claimed 15,000 of its activists were killed in fake encounters and in custody from 1992 to 1999, in the name of operation "clean-up" against criminals in Karachi. The police denied the claim but former Intelligence Bureau director Massood Sharif has admitted in an interview that "a few hundred" were killed in police encounters. The issue is not limited to Karachi, with local media across the country often reporting families claiming that their relatives were killed in suspicious circumstances.
Zia Awan, a Karachi-based senior lawyer and human rights activist says fake encounters are nothing new in Pakistan. "Police have frequently been involved in fake encounters to show their performance," he said.
Awan was in 2010 involved in drafting a bill for investigations into human rights abuses by security forces but said that there is still no proper mechanism to prevent false encounters.
"Even the planned human rights cell has not so far been set up, which shows the government's ignorance towards this serious issue," he said. "Human rights cannot be compromised in any situation, even in wars or military operations."
Many believe the Karachi police use "fake encounters" to get rid of militants in order to avoid the cumbersome judicial process, which supposedly often benefits the accused. Several suspects accused of carrying out attacks on army and police have been exonerated by courts due to a lack of evidence in the last five years, as no independent witness dared to appear against them and courts do not give much weight to police statements against accused.
"If this is the case then all the courts should be closed down, and police should be given the additional responsibility for dispensation of justice," Awan said. "If the judicial system is lengthy and complicated then it is state's fault. It must be revamped, but it cannot justify fake encounters whatsoever."
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