Is Pakistan’s more important fight on the streets of Karachi?

Violence has engulfed Karachi since Oct. 16, with close to 90 dead across the city. An Oct. 17 special election to replace assassinated Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) legislator Raza Haider boiled over long-held tensions between the MQM and the Awami National Party (ANP). Haider was shot dead at the Jamia Mosque in Nazimabad, a suburb of Karachi, on Aug. 2.

Street violence is nothing new to Karachi; the army was forced to restore order in the 90’s, and clashes have oft-occurred in the last few years. After Haider’s death, MQM leaders insinuated that the ANP was responsible, sparking street clashes which left dozens dead. (The MQM and ANP, along with the Pakistan People’s Party [PPP], rule Sindh province in a coalition government; on the national level, the PPP and the MQM rule together.) The MQM retained the seat as the ANP boycotted the poll.

While affairs in Pakistan’s northwest grab the Western headlines, the street battles in Karachi are more important to the Pakistani state. The MQM-ANP violence is not merely political, but carries ethnic undertones. The MQM is largely composed of muhajirs, Urdu-speakers who fled India during the 1947 partition, while the ANP is backed by Pashtuns. Karachi has long been overwhelmingly muhajir, and politically dominated by the MQM, but Pashtuns — including Afghan refugees and internally displaced Pakistanis, as well as economic migrants — have entered the city in increasing numbers over the last three decades. Apparently, familiarity does breed contempt in Pakistan’s most important city.

Karachi has been spared the widespread suicide bombings that have hit cities like Peshawar and Lahore, but the MQM has blamed increasing levels of violence on Pashtun migrants, alleging that they’ve both brought Taliban elements with them and are not doing enough to prevent the "Talibanization" of Karachi. The ANP, not suprisingly, disputes this. (For an example of MQM feelings towards the ANP, read this press release on the recent violence from its head, Altaf Hussain — the ethnic code isn’t very subtle.)

So while the attention paid by the U.S. military, politicians, and media to Pakistan focuses almost solely on the Northwest Frontier Province (NWFP), it is ethnic conflict, not militant Islam, that is a bigger danger to the stability of the Pakistani state. For now, the killings are alleged to be targeted — though this round-up from Dawn seems to point to randomized violence as well. Karachi was entirely shut down Wednesday, and Pakistan can ill afford a situation in which its most vital economic hub is cut off.

The Pakistani military seems to have come to the conclusion that if they can keep the Afghan Taliban onsides by neglecting to crack down, they’re willing to pay the cost of whatever the Pakistani Taliban — at the moment, outside their nominal control — dishes out. But the ethnic conflict exploding on the streets of Karachi this week may turn out to be the far more serious threat.