At least 22 people killed in Pakistan as protesters try to storm US Consulate

KARACHI, Pakistan (AP) — Violent clashes between protesters and security forces in Pakistan's southern port city of Karachi and in the country's north left at least 22 people dead and more than 120 others injured as demonstrators supportive of the Iranian government attempted to storm a U.S. Consulate on Sunday, authorities said.

In the north of the country, demonstrators attacked U.N. and government offices.

The violence came after the United States and Israel attacked Iran, killing its Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Police and officials at a hospital in Karachi said that at least 50 people were also wounded in the clashes and some of them were in critical condition.

President Asif Ali Zardari expressed his “profound sorrow over the martyrdom" of Khamenei and conveyed his condolences to Iran, according to his office. He said: “Pakistan stands with the Iranian nation in this moment of grief and shares in their loss.”

Summaiya Syed Tariq, a police surgeon at the city's main government hospital, confirmed six bodies and multiple injured people were brought to the facility. However, she said the death toll rose to 10 after four critically wounded people died.

In addition, 12 people were killed and over 80 wounded in clashes with police in the northern Gilgit-Baltistan region when thousands of protesters angered by U.S. and Israeli strikes on Iran attacked the offices of the U.N. Military Observer Group and the U.N. Development Programme (UNDP), local police official Asghar Ali said.

A government spokesman, Shabir Mir, said all staff working for those organizations was safe. He said protesters repeatedly clashed with police at various places in the region, damaged the offices of a local charity, and set fire to police offices. However, he said authorities had deployed troops and brought the situation under control.

The U.S. Embassy in Pakistan said in a post on X that it was monitoring reports of ongoing demonstrations at the U.S. Consulates General in Karachi and Lahore, as well as calls for additional protests at the U.S. Embassy in Islamabad and the consulate general in Peshawar.

It advised U.S. citizens in Pakistan to monitor local news, stay aware of their surroundings, avoid large crowds and keep their travel registration with the U.S. government up to date.

In Karachi, which is the capital of southern Sindh province and Pakistan’s largest city, senior police official Irfan Baloch said that protesters briefly attacked the perimeter of the U.S. Consulate, but were later dispersed.

He dismissed reports that any part of the consulate building was set on fire. However, he said that protesters torched a nearby police post and smashed windows of the consulate before security forces arrived and regained control.

Protests in the area surrounding the consulate went on for hours, with dozens of youth, some covering their faces, throwing stones at law enforcement officials and vowing to reach the consulate where hundreds of police and paramilitary officers have been deployed.

The clashes prompted Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi to issue an appeal for calm.

“Following the martyrdom of Ayatollah Khamenei, every citizen of Pakistan shares in the grief of the people of Iran,” Naqvi said in a statement, but urged people not to take the law into their own hands and to express their protests peacefully. The provincial government of Sindh also urged citizens to express their views peacefully and warned against engaging in violence.

In Islamabad, police fired tear gas and swung batons as hundreds of protesters, angered by the killing of Khamenei, tried to march toward the U.S. Embassy. The clashes took place outside the city's diplomatic enclave, where the embassy is located, and additional police had been deployed.

Meanwhile, in the northwestern city of Peshawar, authorities also used tear gas and batons to disperse thousands of demonstrators attempting to approach the U.S. Consulate to hold a rally and to denounce the killing of the Iranian leader, police said.

Protesters also held a peaceful rally in Multan, a city in Punjab province, chanting slogans against Israel and the United States.

Mamoona Sherazi, who attended the rally, said that she was protesting Khamenei's killing. “God willing, we will never bow before America and Israel,” she said.

Protesters also rallied and clashed with police repeatedly near the U.S. Consulate in Lahore, the capital of eastern Punjab province, police said. Authorities said that the government has stepped up security around the U.S. Embassy in the capital, and consulates across the country to avoid any further violence.

Munir Ahmed reported from Islamabad. Riaz Khan and Rasool Dawar in Peshawar, Pakistan, Babar Dogar in Lahore, and Asim Tanveer in Multan, contributed to this story.

Shiite Muslims chant anti U.S slogans during a rally to condemn the killing of Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, in Lahore, Pakistan, Sunday, March 1, 2026. (AP Photo/K.M. Chaudary)

Shiite Muslims take part in an anti U.S. rally to condemn the killing of Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, in Lahore, Pakistan, Sunday, March 1, 2026. (AP Photo/K.M. Chaudary)

Shiite Muslims set a fire at the U.S. Consulate's entrance gate during a rally to condemn the killing of Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, in Lahore, Pakistan, Sunday, March 1, 2026. (AP Photo/K.M. Chaudary)

Firefighters pour water on a burning car, which was set on fire by protestors close to the U.S. Consulate in Karachi, Pakistan, Sunday, March 1, 2026. (AP Photo/Ali Raza)

Paramilitary soldiers take positions at the U.S. Consulate after protesters stormed the building in Karachi, Pakistan, Sunday, March 1, 2026. (AP Photo/Ali Raza)

Police officers chase Shiite Muslims blocking a road and set on fire tires during a protest over the killing of Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, in Karachi, Pakistan, Sunday, March 1, 2026. (AP Photo/Muhammad Farooq)

Police officers and rescue workers examine a burnt police post, which was set on fire by angry protestors close to the U.S. Consulate following protesters stormed the U.S. Consulate in Karachi, Pakistan, Sunday, March 1, 2026. (AP Photo/Muhammad Farooq)

A security officer takes position as a motorcycle which was set on fire by angry protestors is seen outside the U.S. Consulate following protesters stormed the U.S. Consulate in Karachi, Pakistan, Sunday, March 1, 2026. (AP Photo/Muhammad Farooq)

Pakistani Shiite Muslims sit on a road during a demonstration to condemn the death of Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei in a major attack by Israel and the United States, in Lahore, Pakistan, Sunday, March 1, 2026. (AP Photo/K.M. Chaudary)

Pakistani Shiite Muslims sit on a road during a demonstration to condemn the death of Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei in a major attack by Israel and the United States, in Lahore, Pakistan, Sunday, March 1, 2026. (AP Photo/K.M. Chaudary)

Shiite Muslims mourn the death of Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei during a protest against the U.S. and Israel in Lahore, Pakistan, Sunday, March 1, 2026. (AP Photo/K.M. Chaudary)

MEMPHIS, Tenn. (AP) — For 21 years, Steve Fowler and Sam Wilson have performed together in a band on Memphis’ renowned Beale Street. And for the past decade, the men have been neighbors on a quiet, leafy avenue.

But as of Thursday, they will no longer cast the same ballot despite living across the street from each other.

That’s because Tennessee’s Republican-controlled legislature redrew the congressional district of Memphis, which has long enjoyed its own Democratic-leaning U.S. House seat. Now, the city is split into three Republican-leaning districts, its majority-Black population sliced up and bound to mostly white, rural and conservative communities along lines that branch away from Fowler and Wilson’s East Memphis neighborhood.

A line runs down the middle of the street, placing Fowler in the 8th Congressional District, which runs hundreds of miles to central Tennessee across a dozen counties. Wilson is zoned for the 9th District, which extends across most of the state’s southern border before curving up to encompass the largely white and affluent Nashville suburbs.

“I think it’s horrible,” said Fowler, who is white. “This isn’t just going to be bad for Black folks in Memphis, but poor whites in these new districts also aren’t going to get services. How are any of these congressmen going to serve all these different counties?”

The redraw was sparked by a ruling from the conservative majority of the U.S. Supreme Court that may be a death knell for congressional representation of majority-Black Southern communities such as Memphis.

For 60 years, a provision of the landmark Voting Rights Act required mapmakers to prove they were not discriminating against racial minorities in how they drew districts, often leading to political boundaries that allowed some minority communities to vote for their preferred representative rather than having their vote diluted by white majorities surrounding them.

The rule had the greatest effect in Southern states, where neighboring Black and white communities remain highly polarized in partisan politics.

On April 29, the justices court severely weakened that requirement, ruling that the way courts had handled it improperly injected racial matters into redistricting in violation of the U.S. Constitution. Republicans across the South immediately leaped at the chance to redraw their maps before the November elections to eliminate as many Democratic-held, majority-minority congressional seats as possible.

Tennessee’s legislature was the first in a GOP-controlled state to finalize a new map. But it is one of several Southern states — Alabama, Florida, Louisiana, Mississippi and South Carolina among them — engaged in a broader partisan redistricting competition sweeping the country.

Republicans have long complained that the Voting Rights Act prevented them from doing to Democratic, majority-Black districts what Democrats in states they control do to conservative-leaning, white and rural areas — scatter their voters for partisan gain. That is what Tennessee Republicans did in their initial congressional map in 2021 to the state’s other large reservoir of Democrats in Nashville, where they did not have to step gingerly because that city is majority white.

“Tennessee is a conservative state and our congressional delegation should reflect that,” said Republican state Sen. John Stevens, who shepherded the bill for a new map that made all nine congressional districts solidly Republican.

Wilson, the Memphis musician who is Black, was less distraught by the carving up of his neighborhood for partisan purposes. He saw the move as just another trial facing the city after a surge of federal agents sent by President Donald Trump to combat crime and amid narratives about Memphis' safety from neighboring suburbs and Republican state lawmakers.

“It’s a hustling community. We’re going to make ends meet for our families,” Wilson said. “The legacy of Memphis is music and our civil rights history,” he said, adding the two were intertwined. “Hard times mean you’re going to try and find your gift. That’s what we do here; music in Memphis is a way of life.”

The Memphis district predates the Voting Rights Act. For at least a century, well before Congress acted to protect minority voting rights, Tennessee has believed it made sense for its metropolis on the Mississippi River to have its own U.S. House district. But since that law was passed in 1965, anyone who tried to split up the district for partisan gain could be sued and have the maps thrown out. Now, legal experts say that is not much of a risk.

Nonetheless, Democrats and civil rights groups are suing to block the map. The symbolism is especially sharp as the city is home to the National Civil Rights Museum, built around the motel where the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated in 1968. When the legislature passed the new maps, Democrats and protesters shouted “hands off Memphis!” and waved signs accusing Republicans of bringing back Jim Crow.

“Memphis is not just any city; it holds a central place in the national story of our quest for racial justice in this country and how, over time, we have increasingly achieved civil, voting, and economic rights for all Americans,” said Eric Holder, a former U.S. attorney general who chairs the National Democratic Redistricting Committee. “Black citizens protested, marched and died there for the right to vote.”

Memphis has faced dual stories in recent years. Billions of dollars in private investment and federal dollars have flooded into the area in recent years, but many local businesses still express concerns about a lagging regional economy.

Residents who spoke with The Associated Press expressed concerns about safety and public services but bristled at stereotypes about rampant crime. The twin stories are often on display in the river city, where pothole-filled streets run from empty storefronts to ornate mansion-filled neighborhoods and leafy college campuses only blocks away.

The city has long had a contentious relationship with the rest of the state, which voted for Trump in 2024 by a roughly 2-1 margin.

The conservative legislature in Nashville has clashed repeatedly with Memphis and accused its leaders of broad mismanagement. The legislature passed a law blocking many police overhaul efforts in Memphis that were put in place after the death of Tyre Nichols, an unarmed Black man, at the hands of city officers in 2023. It passed another measure seizing control of Memphis’ airport board and those of other cities across the state, and gave the state attorney general, also a Republican, the power to remove Memphis' elected district attorney.

“The state legislature is trying to take it over,” said U.S. Rep. Steve Cohen, the white Democrat who still represents the city in Congress until the new lines kick in after the midterms. “And that’s absurd. It was all partially because it’s a majority Black city.”

Thomas Goodman, a politics and law professor at Rhodes College in Memphis, notes that the new congressional districts may lead to greater friction over who receives attention — and funding — from lawmakers. Memphis residents will soon share districts with Republican towns with starkly different economies, geographies and demographics. Whoever holds those congressional seats will have an incentive to pay attention to those voters and not to Memphis’ population.

“It would not only deprive Black Tennesseans of proper representation,” Goodman said. “These changes also break up the city of Memphis as an entity into multiple districts, thereby removing a dedicated agent in government who knows the people, who understands their concerns and can speak for them and deliver on behalf of their interests and desires.”

Chris Wiley’s house sits in what was, before this week, a quiet street in Midtown Memphis dotted with duplexes, tidy lawns and sports fields. Now his neighborhood is carved apart at the intersection of three congressional districts. That is not surprising, he said, because “Tennessee is all about the dollar” rather than residents.

“Memphis is majority Black, so if you mess with that, what’s the point of even voting in Tennessee?” said Wiley, a 29-year-old sports stadium worker who is Black. “Whatever the congressional numbers, whatever that is, we don’t count on the scale as high, anyway.”

Associated Press writer Nicholas Riccardi in Denver and AP videojournalist Sophie Bates contributed to this report.

Rep. Steve Cohen, D-Tenn., of Memphis stands outside a House hearing room during a special session of the state legislature to redraw U.S. Congressional voting maps Wednesday, May 6, 2026, in Nashville, Tenn. (AP Photo/George Walker IV)

A person leaves the state Capitol after a special session of the state legislature to redraw U.S. Congressional voting maps Thursday, May 7, 2026, in Nashville, Tenn. (AP Photo/George Walker IV)

Steve Fowler, a Beale Street musician whose street was bisected by Tennessee's new congressional districts, strums the guitar in his front yard on Thursday, May 7, 2026, in Memphis, Tenn. (AP Photo/Sophie Bates)

Steve Fowler, left, and Sam Wilson, right, rehearse with their band on Thursday, May 7, 2026, in Memphis, Tenn. (AP Photo/Sophie Bates)

A portion of Shotwell Street in Memphis, Tenn., that is now a dividing line between two newly-redrawn congressional districts, is seen Thursday, May 7, 2026, in Memphis, Tenn. (AP Photo/Sophie Bates)