A general strike shut down parts of Pakistan on Saturday after a coalition of Muslim groups called for a protest to demand that the country's president step down, the Associated Press reported. Shops were closed in parts of the nation's biggest city, Karachi, and in Peshawar, the capital of North West Frontier Province. Business activity also slowed in Lahore, the capital of eastern Punjab province and Quetta, the capital of the southwestern province of Baluchistan, where police said men from the coalition damaged some shops and vehicles. The six-party Mutahida Majlis-e-Amal, or United Action Forum, also called MMA, issued the call for a nationwide strike last month to reject President Gen. Pervez Musharraf's policies and pressure him to resign.
