One of the two bullet riddled bodies found yesterday were on Thursday identified as Jalil Reki, the central information secretary of Baloch Republican Party (BRP).
The party has announced 40 days of mourning and has given a call for a three-day shut down throughout the province to protest the killing of its central leader allegedly at the hands of intelligence agencies.
Reki’s family members alleged that he had been whisked away by the personnel of an intelligence agency on February 13, 2009 from the Sariab area of Quetta while coming out of a mosque after Friday prayers.
Two dead bodies were found on Wednesday in the mountains of Sheraz Koh in Mund Bulo, the border town at Pakistan-Iran border, some 1250 kilometre southwest of Quetta. The bodies were kept at a hospital’s morgue in Turbat town for identification. Another dead body was identified as Mohammad Younus Baloch, a member of the Baloch National Movement (BNM) – a separatist group formed by late Ghulam Mohammad Baloch. Ghulam Mohammad, along with two leaders of the BRP and the BNM, was whisked away in broad daylight, and killed in similar manner.
Reki’s father, Abdul Qadeer Baloch, who had formed the Voice for Baloch Missing Persons with other relatives of missing persons, had been observing a hunger strike outside Quetta Press Club for the release of his son and other missing persons. He claimed that about a dozen personnel arrived in four vehicles and abducted Reki. He said that his son had sacrificed his life for his motherland Balochistan and the Baloch nation and he was proud of him. He promised to continue his struggle for the safe recovery of all Baloch missing persons and he would not give up his struggle for their safe recovery.
Meanwhile, Nasrullah Baloch, chairman of the Voice for Baloch Missing Persons, said the recovered bodies of Reki and Younus Baloch were a slap on the face of rulers and the organisations dispensing justice. He asked international human rights organisations to take notice of the incidents of abduction, extra judicial killings and recovery of decomposed dead bodies of Baloch people.
BNM Chairman Khalil Baloch paid tribute to both Reki and Younus, saying that both the political activists faced mental agony and physical torture before being killed. He said that every dead body was providing fuel for the Baloch struggle for independence.
BRP Spokesman Sher Mohammad Bugti said the recovery of dead bodies reflected the continuation of the state’s policy of genocide towards the Baloch nation. He said that Jalil and Younus had followed Baloch martyred Nawab Akbar Khan Bugti, Nawabzada Balach Marri and hundred of others who had laid their lives for their motherland. He said that over 300 dead bodies of Baloch missing persons had been thrown in the streets since June 2010.