Political killings rock Pakistan's Karachi

KARACHI (Reuters) - A wave of violence between rival political factions is sweeping Pakistan's biggest city of Karachi with at least 26 members of the hostile groups killed in the past week, police said on Monday.

Karachi port is the main gateway for Western military supplies bound for Afghanistan and serious insecurity could disrupt shipments and pile pressure on the government.

While the violence has been confined to targeted tit-for-tat shootings, there are fears street clashes could erupt in the country's commercial hub, which is home to its main port and financial markets.

The country's main stock exchange has ignored the violence but analysts say any escalation is likely to hurt the fragile market.

The violence in the city of 16 million people is between Karachi's dominant political force, the Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM), and a breakaway faction known as the Mohajir Qaumi Movement, or Haqiqi group, as they vie for influence.

Karachi police chief Waseem Ahmed told Reuters that 26 people had been killed in targeted attacks this month up to Sunday, with most of the dead members of the breakaway faction. Other police officials said five people were killed on Monday.

"Karachi is totally anarchic at the moment as there is a serious command and control problem in the political factions," said Mutahir Ahmed, a professor of international relations at the University of Karachi.

Stock analysts say investors are getting used to daily violence in the northwest, although fighting in the Swat valley northwest of Islamabad has unnerved the market over recent weeks.

But violence in Karachi has a more direct impact.

"If the trouble escalates, that could potentially be the last nail in the coffin for our market," said Sajid Bhanji, a dealer at brokers Arif Habib Ltd.

The index, which has gained about 18 percent this year after losing 58.3 percent in 2008, was slightly up on Monday morning.

POLARISATION

Karachi has a long history of ethnic, religious and sectarian violence. Both factions draw their support from the Urdu-speaking families of people who moved to Pakistan from India upon independence from Britain in 1947.

Those people, commonly known as mohajirs, or immigrants, flocked to Karachi where they competed for political and economic power with native Sindhis and later with ethnic Pashtun people.

The MQM is part of the federal coalition and governs in Sindh province, of which Karachi is capital.

Faisal Subzwari, a provincial minister from the MQM, blamed the Haqiqi group for the violence. Spokesman for the breakaway faction were not available for comment.

This year 27 people were killed in clashes between mohajirs and Pashtuns sparked by fear that Taliban militants, who are predominantly Pashtun, were infiltrating the city.

Karachi was a main target of al Qaeda-linked militants after the September 11, 2001, attacks on the United States when Pakistan joined the U.S.-led campaign against terrorism.

However, things have been relatively calm in recent years as the militants have focused attacks across the northwest.

But old fault lines divide communities, while political forces are failing to impose order, Ahmed said.

"There is polarization at every level and there are pockets in the city controlled by different political groups," Ahmed said. "There is a governance problem as well as a lack of political will to handle the situation."

(Additional reporting by Imtiaz Shah; Editing by Robert Birsel and Jeremy Laurence)