E/CN.4/1997/7/Add.2 page 20 (3) careful arrangement for their future after discharge. The aim of prison treatment shall be to give the young offenders whose mind and character are still pliable, such training as is likely to create in them a high standard of social behaviour." 74. Despite these strict rules, during his visit to the Karachi Central Jail the Special Rapporteur saw a juvenile detained in Ward 2 of the Security Cells, which is for prisoners awaiting execution. The juvenile informed the Special Rapporteur that he was 17 years old and that he had been convicted of murder when he was 15 years old. The boy’s file did not contain his age, but his youthful features belied the authorities’ claim that he was an adult. The boy was held in a cell with seven other adults, all of whom had been convicted of murder and were awaiting the death sentence. 75. The Special Rapporteur visited the women’s section of Lahore Central Jail and was able to speak with some of the women prisoners. None of the women complained of ill-treatment and the conditions within the women’s section were far superior to those found in the cells for men. All the women were provided with beds and clean linen and the ward was clean and supplied with electricity and running water, in contrast to the male prisoners who slept on the concrete floors of their cells, which were dark and dank, dirty and overcrowded. The Special Rapporteur spoke to five foreign women who were held in separate quarters. Two of the women claimed to have been ill treated during police custody, but all indicated that they had been treated well within the prison itself. IV. SITUATION IN KARACHI 76. The situation in Karachi and other urban centres of Sindh has been particularly alarming. The central figure in the crisis is the Mohajir Qaumi Movement (MQM), a political party that claims to represent Urdu speakers who fled to Pakistan from India after 1947. Its constituency is drawn primarily from the middle classes of the urban centres. Prior to 1992, MQM in fact exercised control over the urban centres in Sindh and was a very influential part of the provincial government of Jam Sadiq. It is alleged that during this period extremists within MQM exercised a reign of terror on its opponents and dissidents within its ranks. It is widely reported that the extremists operated their own detention centres and torture cells during this period. 77. On 19 June 1992, the army launched Operation Clean-up with the promise of restoring law and order in the city. Since that time thousands have died in the violent conflict between the Government and MQM. The conflict has been exacerbated by fighting between the MQM (Altaf) faction led by Altaf Hussain and the MQM (Haqiqi) faction led by Afaq Ahmed. Sectarian groups such as the Sipah-e-Sahaba Pakistan (SSP), a militant Sunni organization, and the Tehrik-e-Jafria Pakistan (TJP) have also been responsible for acts of violence in Karachi. 78. The year 1995 was particularly violent. The rate of politically motivated murders in Karachi reached an average of 10 per day in July; by the end of the year over 1,800 people had been killed. Many of these killings allegedly occurred in police custody or in staged encounters in which the police or Rangers, the paramilitary force that has replaced the army after