Poll clashes in Pakistan

Press, 1 October 1983, Page 11

Poll clashes in Pakistan

At least 18 people were killed when Pakistan’s turbulent Sind Province completed a first phase of local elections on thursday with a general strike called by banned opposition parties campaigning against the military government. Troops. had shot and killed 17 people and injured 48 in a clash at a village in central Sind as strike action against the election went ahead in most of the province, police sources said. But opposition sources said that 37 people had been killed and about 150 injured in the clash at Chandio, where armed men had ambushed an earlier army patrol, killing one soldier and injuring another.

The; clash, the most serious so far in a 48-day-old civil disobedience campaign by the opposition Movement for the Restoration of Democracy, and other events cast a shadow over the next phase of polling, in six districts which have been the most troubled so far.

Opposition sources said that most of the central and northern Sind had gone on strike to protest against the elections, which opposition parties had boycotted since they were barred from contesting.

They reported a low-to-moderate turn-out in many urban areas and no polling at all at some rural polling stations.