KARACHI (AFP) — Thousands of lawyers protested in Pakistan Thursday as tension mounted over the deaths of 10 people in political clashes between supporters and opponents of President Pervez Musharraf.
The clashes in Karachi are the biggest challenge yet to an anti-Musharraf coalition government that took office in March, and they came amid signs that the mounting unrest is boosting the embattled president's allies.
Both sides blamed a "conspiracy" by the other for the violence, which erupted on Wednesday. The victims included seven lawyers who were burned to death in their office.
Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani said the government would not let the sacrifice by his party's slain leader, Benazir Bhutto, for democracy "to be compromised at the behest of dictatorship, conspiracy and violence."
"We must take notice of these unjustified, mischievous and definitely conspiratorial acts," Gilani told parliament. "These acts I am convinced are being fuelled by those who do not want democracy to flourish."
Bhutto's party and other opposition groups trounced Musharraf's allies in elections in February but are confronting not only political instability but also Islamist violence and economic problems.
Around 2,500 black-suited lawyers marched through the eastern city of Lahore on Thursday accusing the pro-Musharraf Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) party of being "killers" and demanding that the perpetrators be publicly hanged.
Most lawyers have bitterly opposed the president since he sacked the country's outspoken chief justice last year when it looked like the Supreme Court would overturn his re-election as president.
But the MQM has said it was the victim of the Karachi violence, alleging that the clashes started after lawyers allied to the party were attacked while protesting against the beating of a former pro-Musharraf minister.
Musharraf, who seized power in a bloodless military coup in 1999, appeared to blame the pro-democracy lawyers.
He "appealed to the lawyers to remain calm and not to indulge in spreading anarchy" as he left for a trip to China on Thursday, the state-run Associated Press of Pakistan said.
Thousands of paramilitary troops and police were deployed in Karachi on Thursday and authorities warned of "extreme action" to prevent further bloodshed.
Police said the death toll from the clashes had risen to 10 after authorities found another charred body in a lawyers' office where six other corpses were found. All were believed to be lawyers.
Another lawyer injured in the clashes had died in hospital, senior police official Suleman Syed told AFP.
Lawyers in Karachi declared two days of mourning and boycotted courts.
The pro-Musharraf opposition boycotted Thursday's meeting of parliament and also claimed there was a conspiracy, citing beatings dished out to a former minister on Tuesday and an ex-provincial chief minister the previous day.
"The prime minister should have taken strong action after these incidents which seem to be a pre-planned conspiracy," opposition leader and Musharraf-ally Chaudhry Pervez Elahi said.
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