Islamabad: Hundreds of Baloch men, women, elderly and children have gone traceless after Pakistani forces carried out a brutal crackdown on a peaceful ‘Baloch Long March’ and whisked away its participants to prevent them from reaching Islamabad city.
Many non-violent participants were also left injured in the attack by the Pakistani security forces in the form of baton charge.
Baloch Yakjehti Committee (BYC), under whose banner the march was undertaken, said the police detained the participants in a ruthless manner and dispersed them to different locations, raising concerns about their safety.
“Nothing is left more. They (police) have taken everything with them. All the peaceful protesters along with families and females are arrested. We are hopeless and helpless here,” BYC’s Islamabad chapter posted on social media after the brutal police crackdown.
In one of the subsequent posts, it said, “We are continuously attempting to contact all of our peaceful arrested protesters, but unfortunately, we have been unable to reach them all. We want to make it clear that if anything happens to any of the peaceful protesters, the Islamabad Police and the state will be held responsible.”
In another post later, BYC(Islamabad) said, “Still we don’t know the whereabouts of the protesters and their cell phones are off. We request Human Rights Organizations and international to highlight our cause for the immediate release of peaceful Baloch protesters.”
As the police crackdown was underway, Mahrang Baloch, a prominent woman Baloch activist and a leader of the march, posted, “All of the protesters are arrested and kept in different (police) stations. At this time, they are taking women and children to another station. We are unable to connect to our male fellows. We fear that the state will abduct them.”
After this post at 6.18 am (Pakistan Time), there was no post by her, implying that she was also in the custody, at least till this report was filed.
The 1600-km march, launched from occupied Balochistan’s Kech district a week back, was to culminate today at the Islamabad Press Club where the organisers and participants were to articulate, for the international audience, how Pakistani forces indulge in extreme oppression and torture against the Baloch people.
However, thousands of Pakistani forces intercepted the march on the outskirts of Islamabad last night and stopped the participants from going ahead, without giving any valid reasons.
The participants of the march, including mostly the kin of the victims of ‘Enforced Disappearances’ and extrajudicial killings in occupied Balochistan, then sat there only.
Mahrang Baloch said they intended to end their peaceful march at Islamabad Press Club and questioned the authorities why they were not being allowed to do so.
She said the participants only wanted to highlight their grievances in front of Pakistani and international press at the Press Club.
However, the authorities refused to allow them to proceed further, following which the participants picketed the road there itself.
In a video message, she said the campaign represented by the long march will not end.
She said the Pakistani authorities had tried to disrupt the long march earlier also at various places through which it passed.
A number of participants were arrested as the march passed through various cities and towns of Pakistan and cases were lodged against them, she said and demanded their immediate release along with those picked up earlier.
She urged the UN to send a Fact-Finding team to Balochistan to see how people there are facing torture, oppression and human rights violations every day.
The people occupied Balochistan, including many women, launched the massive non-violent campaign to amplify their decades-old grievances related to extreme human rights violations by the Pakistani State.
Lakhs of people participated in the peaceful march.
The Pakistani forces have been indulging in extreme forms of atrocities and oppression against the Baloch people in a bid to maintain illegal occupation of Balochistan in the face of a sustained struggle for Independence from the locals.
Balochistan was illegally occupied by Pakistan in 1948 and a sustained uprising has been going on there for independence.
As part of their unsuccessful efforts to douse the mass sentiment for freedom in Balochistan, the Pakistani forces frequently kill innocent locals in fake encounters and illegally pick up youth whose whereabouts are never known thereafter under a dreaded practice described as ‘Enforced Disappearances’.
Over the several decades, tens of thousands of Baloch people, including youth, women and children, have been the victims of this inhuman practice of ‘Enforced Disappearances’.
While their loved ones keep waiting endlessly, the victims of ‘enforced disappearances’ are never found again. Even when they are killed in illegal custody, their bodies are rarely handed over to their kin.
The latest long-march was triggered by the bizarre inhuman act by the Pakistani forces last month when they tied 3 children to a vehicle and blew it up with an bomb.
The Pakistani State has been trying to scuttle the long-march through various means, including by using force and spreading negative propaganda against the Baloch people and the participants of the march.
The Pakistani security forces tried to stop the march in Dera Ghazi Khan in Punjab Province by using force and detaining 20 key participants. The detained people were released later but cases were filed against them.
This action invited the condemnation by the Amnesty International, the global human rights group, which demanded immediate dropping of all charges against those booked.
The Amnesty International also demanded an impartial investigation into all the extra-judicial killings and enforced disappearances in Balochistan “in line with international standards”.
It also demanded compensation for the families of the victims of extrajudicial killings and those forcibly disappeared.
