“Hidden hands” and body count

Some 2007 of 19,200 missing persons found dead in Baloch insurgency

The long-neglected people of Baluchistan claim to have collected as many as 2007 corpses of their loved ones who, Voice for Baloch Missing Persons (VBMP) claims, have fallen prey to state-terrorism committed in the insurgency-hit province by security and intelligence agencies.

The body count continues, however. VBMP leader Mama Qadeer Baloch puts the number of “innocent” missing Baloch persons at 19,200, all of whom, the movement perceives, stand “martyred”.

Human plight in numbers

Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP) tends to disagree as the VBMP claims that the victims of enforced disappearances include at least 170 women, mostly school teachers, and 169 children of one to 10 years of age.

“Since 2001 we have lifted some 2007 bodies with mutilated faces and this trend of extrajudicial killing is accelerating,” Mama told this reporter at a pictorial protest camp that VBMP erects on-and-off outside Karachi Press Club.

HRCP Chairwoman Zohra Yusuf does not take this “politico-humanitarian” issue as a number game, saying forced disappearances are “illegal” no matter what the numbers are. “Our figures show they (missing persons) are in thousands. Women and children, however, are not included therein,” she told this reporter on telephone.

Claiming to have handed a list of missing persons to his “last hope” namely the United Nations and European Union (EU), VBMP’s Mama insists that “suspicious” lawyers, doctors, engineers, teachers and other highly educated people lifted over the years include women and children.

Well-illustrated in this regard, Mama says, was Zarina Marri, a school teacher who is still missing along with her two-year-old son Murad Marri. “Children have been abducted along with their parents,” claims Baloch leader.

Protesting orphans

Ask any protester at the KPC’s missing persons camp and he or she would point to a photo displaying a friend or relative purported to be “martyred” or missing for months.

Buragh Baloch, a seven-year-old school-going kid from Quetta, was seen showing V (victory) signs to photojournalists snapping protesters at the camp. Buragh had taken leave from his school to protest the killing of his father “Shaheed Mir Jaleel Raki” a couple of years back.

Buragh Baloch, a seven-year-old school-going kid from Quetta, was seen showing V (victory) signs to photojournalists snapping protesters at the camp. Buragh had taken leave from his school to protest the killing of his father “Shaheed Mir Jaleel Raki” a couple of years back. “I don’t know,” the kid innocently replied when asked why his father was killed.

Chakar Rind was there to vent his anger over the enforced disappearance of his cousin Naveed Akhtar on his way back to Karachi from Quetta. Akhtar, Rind says, was a student activist for Baloch rights and was therefore lifted at Awaran some 18 months back.

Lesson not learnt

If not addressed politically these sad narratives of human plight and the undeclared use of force against suspected Baloch separatists would further alienate the under-privileged people of Baluchistan, turning the insurgency into a popular separatist movement, warn independent analysts including HRCP.

HRCP chairperson Zohra minces no words in flaying the country’s all-powerful military establishment for not learning a lesson from history. Bengalis, she warns, had started a movement for their rights and had got Pakistan dismembered in 1971.

Worse than bangladesh

Siddique Baloch, political analyst and editor of Baluchistan Express, still remembers the “unbelievable” protest demonstrations that had broken out spontaneously in hundreds of cities and villages of Baluchistan after the bombing of Nawab Akbar Bugti in August 2006 during the Musharraf era.

“It was a situation worse than Bangladesh,” recalls the veteran journalist who opines that the military was bent upon crushing by force the separatists regardless of human rights issues involved.

Counter-productive use of force

Has the use of force proved counter-productive in Baluchistan?

“Absolutely it has”, said the HRCP chief.

The claim seems to carry enough weight when analysed against the backdrop of deadly terrorist attacks at Sibi railway station and a fruit market in Islamabad that saw on April 8 and 9 at least 41 people killed and 161 others injured at the hands of outlawed United Baloch Army (UBA).

According to Dr Mutahir Ahmed Shaikh, chairman International Relations Department at University of Karachi, Baloch insurgency has intensified especially during 2006-2014. This, the analyst says, is because of an “over-centralised” undemocratic state structure haunting the country since the post-colonial era.

“Baluchistan has been under fire in (19)70s, 90s, 2006 and then now. State agencies cannot be made accountable. The missing persons case is a fallout of the relational gap between state and society,” the political scientist told this reporter.

Dr Shaikh says some “frustrated” elements in Baluchistan had turned separatists after breathing hard for decades under the oppressive regimes of military dictators.

BLA in the making

While innocent Buragh thinks of security agencies, the perceived killers of his father, as “bad guys”, VBMP activist Zahid Ali Baloch laments not having enough courage to join anti-Pakistan militants: Baluchistan Liberation Army (BLA).

Hailing from Dera Bugti and also possessing agriculture lands in Larkana (Sindh), Baloch finds in himself no patriotic feelings for Pakistan where, he claims, genocide of Baloch people was going on. “I would have joined BLA if I had enough courage,” the protester told this scribe. To him, all of the missing persons were “martyred” and none of the institutions in Pakistan, including the Supreme Court, was reliable.

Killing hidden hands

While facts remain shrouded in mystery, stakeholders keep pointing fingers at local and international “hidden hands” for the rampant extrajudicial killing of the missing persons in the resource-rich province.

Mama Qadeer of VBMP blames the Frontier Corps (FC), Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) and Intelligence Bureau (IB) for lifting, interrogating, torturing and killing “suspected” Baloch people.

Citing witnesses, HRCP Chairwoman Zohra tends to buy the impression that local security and intelligence agencies’ are responsible for the enforced disappearances.

Funders of insurgency

While political analysts slam Islamabad for its failure to resolve the issue through dialogue, they do not rule out claims that Baloch insurgents have a backing from regional and extra regional forces. Local authorities are said to have been dealing with the separatists with an iron fist because of the latter’s covert affiliation with Pakistan’s foreign rivals.

The PML-N leadership in Baluchistan sees neighboring India meddling in the insurgency-hit province by funding the insurgent. In a statement reported Friday, Sardar Sanaullah Zehri claimed that Indian spy agency Research and Analysis Wing (RAW) was sabotaging the peace of his province.

Nature of conflict

It is believed that while human rights and political entities tend to sensitise the Baloch missing persons case along humanitarian lines, the country’s civilian and military leadership sees the issue through a strategic lens. “The state-centric view of the issue is strategic in character. Generally speaking, it is a political and human rights issue,” says Dr Shaikh.

Siddique Baloch, political analyst and editor of Baluchistan Express, still remembers the “unbelievable” protest demonstrations that had broken out spontaneously in hundreds of cities and villages of Baluchistan after the bombing of Nawab Akbar Bugti in August 2006.

Political scientists, therefore, warn Islamabad of geopolitical repercussions in case the insurgency intensifies in Baluchistan. Dr Shaikh thinks that regional and extra-regional forces would certainly intervene if Pakistan got weak internally. Siddique Baloch also sees chances for intervention from Iran and the United States if alleged state suppression continues in Baluchistan.

Remedy

HRCP Chairperson Zohra suggests the PML (N) government to assert its authority to find a political solution to the longstanding conflict in Baluchistan. “If you can talk to the Taliban, the killers of more than 50,000 Pakistanis, why not to Balochis, even if they are separatists?” she wondered.

Also, the human rights activist wants the local security and spy agencies to come under civilian government control. “While dealing with insurgency they should also take the rights struggle of the Balochs into account,” she said.

Dr Shaikh too proposes dialogue with the militants. Besides, the redressal of genuine economic issues, provincial autonomy and strengthening of democratic institutions, he says, would isolate the separatists.

To Siddique Baloch, what can resolve the issue politically would include a state amnesty for militants, the withdrawal of forces from the province, and the release of all Baloch people allegedly abducted by the agencies.

Despite all the heart burning he and his disgruntled companions have, Mama Qadeer of VBMP wishes the country’s constitution to be a yardstick for the judicial trial of Baloch accused, particularly the separatists.