Raja Anwar

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Raja Anwar is a Pakistani journalist and writer. He was a fiery student leader in the sixties and joined the Pakistan Peoples Party. He was made a minister by Prime Minister Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto's populist government (1971-76). Raja Anwar escaped to Afghanistan after Bhutto was toppled by a right-wing military coup led by Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq.

In Kabul, Raja Anwar joined Bhutto's elder son, Murtaza Bhutto, and formed Al-Zulfiqar, a leftist insurgency and terrorist organization committed to topple the Zia dictatorship.

Raja Anwar had a falling with Murtaza over the later's controversial terror tactics and wanted to return to Pakistan and help Murtaza's sister, Benazir Bhutto's political struggle against Zia.

He was thrown into a Kabul jail by the Soviet-backed Afghan government on the request of Murtaza. He was released in 1985 after Murtaza shifted his operations to Syria.

Unable to return to Pakistan due to his connections with Al-Zulfiqar, Raja Anwar found political asylum in Germany where he lived till the assassination of Zia-ul-Haq in 1988.

Raja Anwar today lives in Pakistan and writes for various progressive Urdu newspapers.