ATC acquits MQM-P leader Amir Khan in Nine Zero case

KARACHI: An anti-terrorism court (ATC) on Wednesday acquitted senior Muttahida Qaumi Movement Pakistan (MQM-P) leaders Amir Khan, Minhaj Qazi and others in a case related to providing shelter to terrorists at Nine Zero, a former headquarters of MQM.

The accused were set free in the case over insufficient proof. The MQM-P leaders were booked at Aziziabad police station for giving alleged shelter to terrorists.

Back in 2015, the MQM leader was taken into custody by the Rangers in a pre-dawn raid on the party headquarters Nine Zero in Azizabad. Subsequently, he was placed under preventive detention for 90 days for questioning.

According to the FIR registered at Azizabad police station, Khan, who was in charge of the party headquarters security at that time, with Minhaj Qazi, Raees Mama, Naeem, Aijaz Niazi, Shahzad Mullah and others had allegedly provided shelter to criminals and had been using them for terrorist activities in the city.

Mama and other absconding accused had been declared as proclaimed offenders.

PPP leader Dr Asim Hussain, a close aide of former president Asif Ali Zardari, is too facing similar charges. In two separate cases, he had been accused of treating and harbouring suspected terrorists and gangsters at the North Nazimabad and Clifton branches of his hospital.