Karachi: Violent upsurge

Karachi has followed a distinct pattern through the year: steady rounds of death, followed by periods during which the daily toll suddenly soars, marking a peak on the graph. We have seen many such peaks, with nearly 2,000 people killed so far in our largest city during 2012. Who knows what the number will be by the time we reach the new year. The situation certainly doesn’t seem to be heading in a better direction any time soon. In the latest spate of apparently targeted killings of mostly sectarian nature, scores of people have been killed within three days Who knows how long this senseless violence will continue, or what more we will have to bear in the coming days. These murders, eerily following a similar pattern, have gone on for too long. We know they are linked to the sectarian strains, together with ethnic and criminal tensions, that run through the city. The political nature of this violence only serves to further complicate matters. This is also one reason why law-enforcement agencies have remained so utterly unable to tackle the situation. Worse still, as has happened repeatedly in the past, there is every danger the situation could worsen. Karachi just needs a single tossed match to ignite a huge blaze of violence. The question is if there is still time to prevent this from happening. Somehow this violence has to be stopped before more lives are lost and more destruction wreaked on a city that today struggles to survive.