Rangers to provide security to foreign investors: DG

Sindh Rangers director general Major General Bilal Akbar said here on Monday that the Rangers' Special Task Cell will provide security to foreign investors visiting Karachi with a view to creating a sense of security and a business friendly environment in the metropolis.
He was speaking at a meeting of Karachi Chamber of Commerce and Industry (KCCI). It was attended, among others, by Businessmen Group's (BMG) chairman and KCCI's former president KCCI, Siraj Kassam Teli, BMG vice chairmen Zubair Motiwala and Anjum Nisar, KCCI president Iftikhar Ahmed Vohra, senior vice president Mohammad Ibrahim Kasumbi, vice president Agha Shahab Ahmed Khan, Citizens-Police Liaison Committee's chief Ahmed Chinoy, KCCI's former presidents Majyd Aziz, A. Q. Khalil and managing committee members.
The DG Rangers asked the business community to share details about foreign investors' engagements in Karachi at least one or two weeks prior to their arrival in the city so that the Rangers Special Task Cell could make security arrangements for them.
Highlighting the performance of Sindh Rangers, he informed the business community that the Rangers in the last one month carried out 250 operational activities in Karachi with an average of seven to eight operational activities per day. During the same period, a number of terrorists belonging to Tehrek-e-Taliban, gang warfare and criminals involved in sectarian killings, robberies and street crimes, were arrested, besides cache of arms was also recovered.
Claiming that Rangers have succeeded in improving the sense of security amongst Karachiites to a certain extent, he said that the job was not over and lot more still needed to be done. "Currently, Sindh Rangers was working on various fronts, including counter terrorism operation, counter sectarian operations, targeted killings and kidnapping for ransom", he added.
Earlier, BMG's Chairman Siraj Kassam Teli said that Karachi Chamber has always been asking for more powers for Rangers. Voicing his concern over politicization of police department, he said that most of appointments in police department were being made on political grounds and it was the key reason for the prevailing lawlessness in the city.
He said that though some improvement has been witnessed in the city's overall law and order situation, still incidents of street crimes, kidnapping for ransom and extortion were still taking place in the old city areas and Defence Society. He also asked DG Rangers to float the idea of setting up an independent agency for carrying out district-wise survey so as to know the actual security situation prevailing in the city.
He was of the view that instead of taking out processions on streets during Muharram, a strategy should be evolved in consultation with all stakeholders to confine such processions to specific areas, preferably in parks and grounds of the city as such a move would, on the one hand, provide security to the processions and, on the other, help in regulating vehicular traffic and in minimise the sufferings of the people.
In his welcome speech, KCCI President Iftikhar Ahmed Vohra voiced his concern over incidents of targeted killings, violence, kidnapping for ransom, extortions, rampant street crimes and some cases of looting vehicles loaded with goods. He attributed closure of businesses, flight of capital and massive unemployment to the city's poor law and order situation.