1) According to the 1981 census, between 5,103,000 and 5,353,000 people live in Karachi [The first statistic is provided by: La grande encyclopédie du monde, vol.VII, (Bruxelles, Lugano and Montréal: Atlas, 1984), p. 2919. The second statistic is found in: Goetz P.W. et al., eds. The New Encyclopaedia Britannica, Micropaedia, volume VI, (Chicago et al.: Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1989), p. 735.].

2) No breakdown by religion of the Karachi population is available in official sources. There are some Ahmadis in Karachi, since there is at least one Ahmadi mosque in the downtown area [Telephone conversation with a specialist of religion in Pakistan, Professor at Carleton University, Ottawa, 27 November 1989.]. Lawyers in Karachi work on Ahmadi cases on a daily basis [Gualtieri A. R. Conscience and Coercion, (Montréal: Guernica, 1989), p. 59.]. Some Ahmadis of Karachi were assassinated in 1986 [Ahmadiyya Muslim Association, The Plight of Ahmadi Muslims, (Toronto: AMA, 1987), p. 13.].

The Ahmadiyya Muslim Association offices in Toronto estimate that the Ahmadi community in Karachi is relatively small, numbering no more than 100,000 individuals [Phone conversation with a spokesperson from the Ahmadiyya Muslim Association in Toronto, 27 November 1989.]. There are approximately ten Ahmadi mosques in Karachi [Ibid.].

3) The Ahmadis in the provinces of Sindh and Punjab (Karachi's province) are obliged to declare themselves non-Muslims in order to exert their right to vote and to bury their dead in segregated cemeteries, which have been desecrated in the past [Petrén G., H. Cull, J. McBride and D. Ravindran, Pakistan: Human Rights After Martial Law, (Genève: International Commission of Jurists, 1987).]. The Ahmadis of Karachi are subject to the same laws that affect the daily life of believers of the Ahmadiyya faith throughout Pakistan [Ahmadiyya Muslim Association in Toronto, 27 November 1989.]. Their religious practices are controlled by Ordinance XX of 1984, which puts official limitations to their rights as citizens of Pakistan [Please see the text of Ordinance 1984, reprinted in: Gualtieri A.R., Ibid.]. Please refer to the attached previous responses to information requests similar to yours [Information request PAK1999 of 6 September 1989: general background; Information request PAK2880 of 14 November 1989: recent events.].

4) Rabwah is not a major city of Pakistan, and therefore no precise information concerning its total population is available. Most Rabwah families, however, are Ahmadis and the city contains at least two Ahmadi mosques and one orthodox mosque [Telephone conversation with a Professor in the Department of Religious Sciences at Carleton University, Ottawa, 27 November 1989.]. The Ahmadiyya Muslim Association of Toronto gives the figure of 30,000 to 40,000 Ahmadis in Rabwah, or 95% of the population [Phone conversation with a spokesperson from the Ahmadiyya Muslim Association in Toronto, 27 November 1989.].

5) Because of the fact that Rabwah is a small town by Pakistani standards, there is no specific information on Rabwah's economic reality at the Documentation Centre of the IRB. Please refer to the documents attached, which provide information on the Pakistani economy as a whole [Kurian G.T. Encyclopedia of the Third World, vol.II, (New York and Oxford: Facts on File, 1987), p. 1514-1520.]. Rabwah, however, is part of the Lahore region, which is industrialised and prosperous [Goetz P.W. et al., eds. The New Encyclopaedia Britannica, Macropaedia, vol.XXV, (Chicago et al.: Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1989), p. 384.].

One of the resource persons consulted, however, knew a little about the commercial situation of Rabwah and described it as follows: [Telephone conversation with a Professor in religious sciences at Carleton University, Ottawa, 27 November 1989; all the information contained in this paragraph has been provided by him.] the city did not possess many service industries and infrastructures before the Ahmadis arrived there in 1947, after the partition of India. It is they who developed the city and who now own most businesses. There is a huge semi-circular shopping centre close to the Ahmadi headquarters.