Juan Cole

Here's Juan Cole on Pakistan, overnight:

The seriousness of the situation in the streets of some of Pakistan's important towns and cities doesn't seem to me to be being reported in the US press and media. In contrast, Pakistani newspapers are giving chilling details of large urban centers turned into ghost towns on Friday morning, with no transport available, hundreds of thousands of persons stranded far from home, shops closed, and banks, gas stations, police stations and automobiles torched. Karachi, Hyderabad, Larkana, Sukkur, Jacobabad and many others in Sindh Province fell victim to the violence (Bhutto was from Larkana in Sindh but had a residence in Karachi). The police seemed to be AWOL for the most part in these cities, allowing the rioting and looting to go on unhindered. Here is a tally of violence in the major port city of Karachi (population 8 million) overnight, resulting from riots to protest the killing of Benazir Bhutto: Number of vehicles burned: 150 Number of streets where tires were set afire: 26 Number of banks set on fire: 16 Number of gas stations torched: 13 Number of persons shot dead: 10 Number of persons injured: 68 Number of PIA flights coming in: 0 Number of shops and businesses closed: Most

He concludes:

Folks, I've seen civil wars and riots first hand, and revolutions from not too far away, and this situation looks pretty bad to me.