2007 Karachi Riots - General Strike and National Holiday

General Strike and National Holiday

On 14 May 2007, opposition parties called for a general strike in Lahore, paralyzing the city and protesting the government response to the riots. 8,000 people, including lawyers and human rights activists, chanted "Out with Musharraf!" and "Death to Altaf Hussain!" In addition, protestors burned effigies of Musharraf and hundreds forced their way through a police barricade.

Authorities responded by banning demonstrations and declaring a national holiday. Shops were closed and public transportation was shut down in the country’s major cities. It is the largest strike in Pakistan since Musharraf assumed his presidency in 1999, with much of the unrest stemming from news reports that government troops were in Karachi,

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