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Balochistan Dossier 2006

BNP UK Chapter

BALOCHISTAN DOSSIER

Pakistan Military Operation And Human Rights Violations in Balochistan


KILLINGS

DISAPPEARANCES..

TORTURE

TALIBANIZATION OF BALOCHISTAN

BY BALOCHISTANNATIONALPARTY UK CHAPTER JUNE-2006


Bnp_ukchapter@gmail.com

Balochistan Dossier 2006

BNP UK Chapter

CONTENTS
1. Introduction; Divided Map of Balochistan, Geo-political Importance 2. BALOCH-PAKISTAN RELATIONS, HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVE 3. HISTORY OF MILITARY OPERATIONS IN BALOCHISTAN Military Operation Against Balochistan 4. ON-GOING MILITARY OPERATION REASON & CAUSES Mass Disappearances of Political Activists by Military Intelligence 5. Details of Disappeared Activists and Torture Victims. 6. Political Agitations for Recovery of Activists. 7. Amnesty International Urgent Appeals on Balochistan Conflict and Disappearances Harassment, Fear and Threat to Baloch Political Leaders 8. Exit Control List Letters and Appeals Copy. 9. Sample of letter issued by Islamabad to Baloch Leaders Use of LANDMINE by Military and Paramilitary in Balochistan 10. World Landmine Report 2005 on Pakistan. 11. Landmine Victims of Balochistan. Talibanization of Balochistan by Military 12. MMA (Mullah Military Alliance Government in Balochistan) 13. International Comments on Talibanization of Balochistan and Region. 14. Editorials of National newspapers on Financial Mismanagement and looting of wealth by Pro-Taliban Regime in Balochistan backed by ISI International Comments on Balochistan Operation Pakistan's Other War , TIMES REPORT Pakistan's battle over Balochistan; (BBC) Pakistan's forgotten war (CNN) Pakistan's Costly 'Other War'By Selig S. Harrison (Washington Post) In Remote Pakistan Province a Civil War Festers (New York Times) The War in Pakistan (Washington Post) EUROPEAN UNION STATEMENT ON BALOCHISTAN MILITARY OPERATION h. Pakistan; Resurgence of Baloch Nationalism by Frederic Grare, CARNEIGE ENDOWMENT PAPER a. Annexture International Comments on Balochistan Operation a. b. c. d. e. f. g. 15. HUMAN RIGHTS COMMISION OF PAKISTAN FACT FINDING MISSIONS VISIT AND REPORT ON BALOCHISTAN MILITARY REPORT AND HUMAN RIGHT VIOLATIONS. 16. US CONGRESS MAN LETTER TO SECRETRY STATE ON BALOCHISTAN CRISIS. PICTURES; PROOF OF ARMY OPERATION, WORLD-WIDE PROTEST, AGITATION AND DEMONSTRATION BY THE BALOCH POLITICAL PARTIES AND ACTIVISTS AGAINST PAKISTANS MILITARY OPERATION IN BALOCHISTAN

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Dear Friends, Balochistan is going through its critical phase of history, this is the fifth time that Pakistan Military rulers are suppressing the political voice of innocent people of Balochistan through Fighter Jets, Gunship helicopters, Heavy Artillery and Military hard wares. Balochistan is Pakistans largest and natural resource rich province and yet the least developed. The people of the province have historically seen the riches of their land exploited not for their benefit but for that of the dominant province of Punjab. The practice continues today. Whenever the people of Balochistan have raised their voice demanding their just rights, including the utilization of the provinces resources for their welfare, their voices have been stifled by the military might of the state of Pakistan. Baloch history since the creation of Pakistan is replete with instances of the tanks and gunship helicopter and fighter jets deployed by the aggressive Pakistans army against the innocent masses of Balochistan. In Balochistan people have been subjected to severe human rights violations ranging from disappearances, torture, killings, illegal detainment and arrests of civil and political activists. In addition, intelligence agencies have created an environment of fear, insecurity in the region, and several political activists and members of political parties including parliamentarians have been subjected to denial of access, freedom of speech and movement against those opposing the exploitation of resources, killing of civilians and military operation in the region. Eventually, the Baloch Political leaders and elected Parliamentarians have been denied freedom of movement, and their names have been placed on Exist Control list (ECL) by the Ministry of Interior, Government of Pakistan (Annex A lists the names of members on ECL). People of Balochistan have appealed to the international community to persuade the military-led Government of Pakistan to halt the wanton massacre of innocent men, women and children and listen to what to what the people of Balochistan are saying since the accession of their land with Pakistan. All that they have demanded is the right to live in dignity, not to have their welfare ignored and to see their province flourish as an economic powerhouse. But, instead the response of the present military regime has been in keeping with past trends to violently and aggressively crush all democratic protests. Veteran Baloch politicians including Elected representatives of Balochistan like President of Pakistan Oppressed Nation Moment and Former Chief Minister Sardar Attah Ullah Mengal (80 years old), former chief minister and President of Democratic Party Nawab Akbar Khan Bugti (82 years old), Veteran Baloch politician Nawab Khair Bux Khan Marri (78 years old) including President Balochistan National Party Akhatar Mengal, Senator Sanaullah baloch, Member Parliament of Pakistan and other Baloch parliamentarian Mr. Abdul Rauf Mengal (Member National Assembly), Mr. Senator Agha Shaid Bugti, Our Party and including tow former Senators (Mr. Javed Mengal, Mr. Amanuulah Kanrani, and one Member Provincial Assembly (MPA) Mr. Mir Balach Khan Marri including our family

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members have been placed on the Exit Control List, denying the right to travel and freedom. In the eyes of Military regime representation of the aspiration of Baloch people is a crime for which we are to be confined within the borders of Pakistan turning our country in to MEGA PRISON. Four Baloch websites have been blocked by Pakistan telecommunication Authority with out any reason, notice and justification. The people of the province want an end to the senseless state violence that has been impacting the economic and social life of the province. As democrats we believe that all problems and conflicts between people can be resolved through a process of serious, sincere and meaningful political dialogue. International Community can play a vital role to mediate and intervene in this crisis to prevent more innocents to be killed by ruthless ARMY. Balochistan Dossier is aim to provide some in-depth information and understanding on Balochistan and will help to understand the complex situation in the region. International Community timely attention not only can save the hundred of thousands of life in Balochistan, but they can also join hands with Democratic Baloch forces against the fundamentalist those are supported openly by the intelligence agencies in Balochistan.

Sincerely, Balochistan National Party UK, London Chapter Jun 2006

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Balochistan divided in Pakistan and Iran

BALOCHISTAN Geo-Strategic Importance


Located in between South Asia, South west Asia and Central Asia. Full of Natural, Mineral and Energy Resources. Pakistan gets its 40% Natural Gas According to official figures. (before 1992 Gas Production was 72%) It has World Three Largest Copper Gold deposits. Gateway to Hot-Water (Strait of Hurmoz) It provides Strategic depth to Pakistan and Iran. Pakistan tested its Nuclear Bomb on 28th May 1998 in Balochistan and Pakistan has its Three Nuclear and Chemical Weapon developing Sites and Six Missile Testing Sites in Balochistan. Balochistan Share 1173 KM Long Border With Iranian Controlled Balochistan Balochistan Share 837 KM Long Border with Afghanistan. Future Regional Energy Grid; Most of the future proposed Gas pipelines like; Iran-Pakistan-India, Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan, and Qatar-PakistanIndia Gas pipe lines have to pass-through Balochistan.

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BALOCH-PAKISTAN RELATIONS-1947-48
3RD JUN 1947 Indian Independence Act Announced 12 August 1947, Balochistan (Kalat) announces its independence. 4th August, 1947 Agreement signed and announced on 11th August 1947. B/w British Government, Kalat State, & Government of Pakistan (proposed). Mohammad Ali Jinnah Governor general of Pakistan put pressure on Khan of Kalat( Ruler of Balochistan) for merger. Khan referred the matter to the Baloch Parliament (Upper & Lower House) Both Houses Rejected Merger Proposals in their meetings held on December 14, 1947 and January 4, 1948 respectively. Lower House again rejected the idea in its meeting held on February 25, 1948. March 17, 1948, integral parts of Kalat unlawfully annexed in to Pakistan (Kharan, Makran and Lasbella states) March 27, 1948, Khan Of Kalat Individually signed the Accession of Kalat State with Pakistan. This was in clear violation of the constitution of Kalat and the decisions of Baloch Parliament.

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History of Military Operations 1948-60


1st Military Operation
First Military Enter in to Kalat on 15th 1948 April to Control the Kalat Affair after Forced Accession. Imposition of ONE UNIT & Opposition of Balochistan.

2nd Military Operation


October 6, 1958 Pakistan Army arrested Khan of Kalat killed more then 20 Baloch innocents outside the Khan Palace and operation continued till 1960. October 7, 1958 1st martial Law proclaimed by M.G Iskandar Mirza.

3rd Military Operation


In 1960, the Government launched and escalate the scale of military operation & setup special military courts in most Parts of Balochistan and killed undred of innocent Baloch activist in torture cells.

4th Military Operation After Bengal Military Aggression Against Balochistan


First Nationalist Government Formed in 1972 in Balochistan. Shah of Iran and Z.A. Bhutto Regime in Pakistan was not comfortable with National Awami Party governmentt. February 6, 1973 Federal government sent troops to Balochistan February 10, 1973 Pakistani intelligence agencies established a story and recovered arms from an Iraqi diplomat residence linked with the Balochistan moment. February 12, 1973 Bhutto dismissed NAP (Sardar Attahullah Mengal) government and imposed emergency, banned the NAP Full-fledge Military operation started against people of Balochistan during 1973 to 1977 From 1973-77 Baloch suffered 50,00. casualties And Military suffered some 3,500 casualties.

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The Current Military Operation


The 5th Military Operation Started soon after take over of General Musharaf in 1999. It further escalated after signing Gwadar Port Project in Beijing with China and proposed Establishment of Three Cantonments in resource rich districts of Balochistan. In 1st Phase of Military Operation, Intelligence Agencies Started threatening, Arrest and Illegal detention and Disappearances of Political Activists. In 2002 Election, ISI fully supported the Pro-Taliban Religious Group and alienated Progressive and Democratic Nationalist Forces in Province. July 2004, Makran Region including Gwadar came under military Operation. On 7th Jannuary and 17th March 2005, Dera Bugti Came under Military Attack. When military refused to arrest a military officer involved in Dr. Shazia Khalid rape case. 17th December 2005, after attack on General Musharaf in Kolu, Full Fledge Military Operation started in all parts of Balochistan. After Overwhelming Rally on 2nd April 2006,against military operation in Quetta, Military has launched Operation and crackdown against BNP activists and leaders.

Pakistani Administrative Balochistan under Military Operation

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Casualties in Current Military Operation


KILLED; Around 700 Seven Hundred People Have been killed from 17th December 2005 to 20th April 2006. Around 900, people have been killed so far in last Five year by the recent conflict. More then 150 people Killed by Landmine Incidents. Around 200 have been killed by Bomb blasts. DISPLACED: 140,000. People have been displaced so far by the aggressive use of force against civilians in Dera Bugti and Kolu Districts. DISAPPEARED: Four Hundred and Fifty (450) Political Activists are missing and have disappeared. AREESTS: According to Federal Minister for Interior (Pakistan) statement, 4000 Political Activists and Leaders are Arrested and they are detained with out trial from Last Five Years.

Families Killed by Heavy Bombardments in Kolu District

Lethal Weapons used against innocent Civilian by Pakistan Army and Air Force

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Causes of Current Conflict


Over Centralization & Military Rule. Central Government EXPLOITATION AND Pro-Taliban Policies Increasing Role of Military & cantonments in Balochistan Political, Social and Economic Alienation of the Baloch People Chinese Exploitation and Strategic developments. Strategic Exploitation of Balochistan
Pakistan has its Three Nuclear and Chemical Weapon developing Sites in Balochistan. There are Three Navel Bases in Balochistan and Fourth one with Chinese Assistance is under-construction at GWADAR , opposite to the Strait of Hurmoz. Pakistan has Six Missile Testing Ranges in Balochistan. Pakistan has Seven Air Force bases in strategic parts of Balochistan. Army has Six Major Cantonments & 59 Fifty Nine (Para-Military) Facilities in Balochistan.

Mega military developments in Balochistan

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Social Conditions of People in Balochistan


85% Population of Balochistan Lacks Safe Drinking Water 80% Population is Without Electricity 63% Population lives below the Poverty Line Balochistan has highest Infant Mortality Rate & Lowest Literacy Rate in the Region (18%) 50% Children in Balochistan are compelled to get education in Religious Schools (Madressa) 70% Children are deprived of schools and modern education. Balochistan has Federal debts of over 65 Billion Rupees. Balochistan Over-drafted 15 Billion Rupees From the State Bank of Pakistan, and most of the Money has been spent and used by Pro-Taliban Ministers.

Baloch Children are deprived from School, Collages and Hospitals, BUT Military has plans to establish three more cantonments in Balochistan with Cost of Rs; 9 Billion

Social Condition of People of Balochistan

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A Picture says a thousand words


Pictures speak: The drought which continued since 1996, have taken its toll in human and animal life and huge economic loss. These are the living conditions of a Baloch family, which is a very common site through out Balochistan. The Government is doing nothing to bring them any relive from this suffering and hardship.

2003; These Pictures are From District Chaghi, where Pakistan tested its 140 Billion worth of Nuclear Bomb.

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These Childrens are the owner of World Three Largest Copper Gold deposits, but there miserable condition reveal the Pakistans military rulers policy of development and Exploitation.

BALOCHISTAN-WORLD COPPER-GOLD COMPARISION

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Why not SCHOOLS, COLLAGES, UNIVERSITIES & HEALTH FACILITIES???

Why Cantonments in Balochistan?


Balochistan Provincial Assembly unanimously Adopted a Resolution on 23 September 2004 against the establishment of New Cantonments in Balochistan. There are Four (6) Major Army, Fifty Nine (59) Paramilitary Cantonments and three (3) Navel Bases in Balochistan. Military regime in Pakistan has a plan to establish three (3) more cantonments in Gwadar, Dera Bugti (SUI) and Kolu district of Balochistan.

Intention behind Cantonments?


All three cantonments are intended to Support Commercial, Economical and Business interests of Ruling Elite of Army, Chinese investment and Punjab settlements.

Military Elite has intention to grab lands for Housing and Commercial use. To promote and protect settlements coming from out side Balochistan Particularly from Karachi and Punjab. To protect Chinese Companies in Gwadar and Dera Bugti and Kolu Districts for oil and gas exploration and exploitation. To suppress the Local masses. Control all development process and keep away the Locals. Support and provide hideouts and Training to Pro-Taliban elements in cantonments.

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DISAPPEARNCES TORTURE ARRESTS


Mass Disappearance of Baloch Political Activists in Balochistan

Worst Form of Torture Cells and Illegal Detention Centres BY ISI, MI AND NON-BALOCH POLICE in Balochistan

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DISAPPEARANCES Disappearances are some of the most distressing human rights violations, taking their toll not only on the persons directly affected but on their families as well who have to live with the uncertainty of not knowing where and how their loved ones are held. Needless to say, disappearances are forbidden in law and in the Constitution which guarantee to anyone the right to be informed of the charges against them, to be brought before a magistrate within 24 hours, to have legal assistance and to see their families. Most important, everyone has the right to be treated in accordance with law and to enjoy the protection of law. Following this the list of people been abducted by the Pakistani agencies and so called law enforcement personals, most of them are still missing and some of them are under sever torture and in the custody of agencies. Ali Asghar Bangulzai, Hafiz Saeed Bangulzai Baluch were abducted by Pakistani agencies almost 4 year ago but their fate or whereabouts are still undisclosed. Five men from Noshki and six men form Gawader Balochistan (we don't them by name) were also picked up by Pakistani authorities and were transferred to unknown places; no family member is informed about their whereabouts.

Ali Asghar Bangulzai Baloch-Missing from last Four Years.

From Last Four years Father of these Children Ali Asghar Bangulzai is disappear., These Children's are on Hunger Strike from Last tow Years in Front of Quetta Press Club Balochistan, Pakistan.

Ali Asghar Bangulzai Baloch, a tailor master by profession, was arrested on June 1st, 2000, by security and intelligence agencies in the presence of his nephew, Naserullah. Three people entered his shop and called him outside, where three vehicles with tinted glasses were parked. According to Naserullah, and later Ali, three army officials were sitting with G-3 rifles in their hands. Ali was whisked away and his nephew threatened into silence with a promise made of releasing Ali after interrogation. He was later released after 14 days. According to Alis relatives, he was tortured and interrogated in connection with the murder of Justice Nawaz Marri.

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Months later, on October 18th, 2000, he was picked up again along with his relative Mr. Iqbal, while riding a bicycle past Degree College, Quetta. Mr. Iqbal was released after 22 days. Ali remains missing. On April 27th, 2002, Ali's family gave up hope of his returning and made some efforts for his release. They met Corps Commander Abdul Qadir Zari and sought his help. On May 15th, 2002, two officials of the ISI visited the family and assured them that Ali was well and would soon return. They also discouraged them from protesting, implying that in doing so, they would damage the interest of the abductees.

After receiving no word of Alis whereabouts, the family met Brigadier M.Sadique of the ISI who made inquiries from Colonel Bangish. According to the testimony of the family, the Brigadier received a file from the Colonel, which he inspected. He then comforted the family and promised to help. After the meeting, the family visited several officials and at each occasion begged for the release of Ali or delivery of his dead body. Each time they were promised that the victim would soon be released. During this process, Brigadier M. Sadique also gave some money to the family and eventually agreed to take some clothing from them, promising that it would be delivered to Ali. Finally, the family members met the Governor of Balochistan in the presence of the Balochistan Vice Chairperson of HRCP. The Governor was most courteous and sympathetic. Later, at another meeting, again in the presence of HRCP Vice Chairperson, the Governor informed the family that Ali was not in the custody of any official agency or security force. This was disputed and it was pointed out by a family member that if this was so, then why did the ISI official give them a sum of Rs.25,000 and receive clothes intended for Ali. The Governor responded that the money was given on compassionate grounds and the clothing was received in order to seek Alis whereabouts through a Sufi, who would perform a mystic ritual known as dum. Ali is a father to eight children, and was forty years old at the time of his disappearance. His family is on token hunger strike outside the Quetta press club. On 22nd September 2005, Abid Saleh, the younger brother of the afore-mentioned Gwahram Baloch, was also kidnapped by the operatives of the army agencies. He is still missing.

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LIST OF POLITICAL ACTIVISTS MISSING FROM DISTRICT KECH, TURBAT DURING LAST TOW YEARS. S;No 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12. 13. 14. 15. 16. 17. 18. 19. 20. NAME Gohram saleh Tariq Jasim Muslim Yaqoob Abdul Ghani Abdul Latif Allahyar Bakhshi Saleh Abdul sattar Raja Ahmad khan Nadeem Faqir Tariq Dr. Hanif Sharif Sattar Baloch Naimatullah bakhsi Nizam Alias hale Nadeem Rasool Bux Bukhshi Haji Mohammad Sameer Miyah Haleem jummah Whaid Nuzrat Abid Shadad RESIDENT OF Jathjoo, Turbat Talamb Mund Chat, Mund Talamb Mand Talamb Mund Jhatjoo, Mund Soro, Mund ShaiTump Turbat Nasirabad Turbat Menu kalatuk Turbat City Buleda Talamp, Mand Bullo, Mand Bullo, Mand Jalalaabad, Mand Talab, Mand Rek Bazar Mand RekBazar Mand Turbat DATE OF DISAPPEARANCE August 8, 2004 August 8, 2004 July, 2004 2005 2005 November29, 2005 December13, 2005 December29, 2005 2005 2005 December18, 2005 2006 January 11, 2006 February 7, 2006 February 7, 2006 February 8, 2006 February 8, 2006 February 11, 2006 February 11, 2006 2006

20, Pakistan Petroleum Limited Employees of Dera Bugti are Missing Names of C. B. A of PPL (Sui) office Bearers picked up by Pakistani agencies form Karachi on the 9th of December 2005, around 2:30 (am) in the morning 1. Mirza Shoukat 2. Sher Mohammed Bugti 3. Naiz Ahmed Sheik 4. Ghulam Mohammed Bugti 5. Tanveer 6. Hakeem Ali Bulaidi 7. Saifullah Bugti 8. Naiz Mohammed Bugti 9. Khuda bux Bugti 10. Habibullah Sheik 11. Waqar Ali sheik 12. Ali Ahmad Bugti 13. Umed Ali Bugti 14. Mahmood Bugti 15. Abdul Hamid Bugti 16. Naeem 17. Haji Ijaz Keshmeri president General Secretary Sr V P VP VP VP Deputy General Secretary Adl: General Secretary Treasurer Propaganda Secretary Member of executive committee Member of executive committee Shop Stewart Shop Stewart Shop Stewart Shop Stewart Team Agreement

Balochistan Dossier 2006 18. Haji taj Mohammed 19. Abdul Aziz 20. Faiz Mohammed

BNP UK Chapter Guest (later released) Guest (later released) Guest (later released)

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Cases against these above mentioned people are not known as the Pakistani authorities are denying about their whereabouts, so unless they are not brought to surface the charges against will remain unknown. Family member of these people have ruined their days and nights to find out about their whereabouts but no singe of them anywhere. The following people were arrested/ abducted by the Pakistani authorities on the 27/04/2006 and 20/04/2006 form Mand Fulfer area of Balochistan and their fate is still unknown. The family members have protested several times and register files against their disappearance but no action has been taken by the Pakistani courts and authorise. 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. Attuallah Baloch An ordinary daily wages worker Mohammed Hashim Baloch occupation unknown Yaar Mohammed Baloch Business man Gull Mohammed Baloch 1 Labour Gull Mohammed Baloch 2 Had his own business Jasim Baloch occupation not known Mohammed Eshaq Business man Meeya Baloch Labour Mohammed Anwar Baloch not known

The following people are arrested form different places of Balochistan many of them are under Anti Terrorist Forces custody and many are still missing. Those who are under ATF or Military Intellegance custody their condition is really bad, cause of sever torture and no family member or friends are allowed to see them.

1. Haji Jan Mohammed Marri arrested Jul 2005 still missing Hes a Baloch tribal elder and was arrest form New Kahan (Marri Camp) at the time of arrest he was at home, hes 80 year of age. Whats the reason behind his arrest only God knows as no one else knows about his whereabouts? 2. Mazar Khan Marri arrested October 2005 still missing Mazar Khan owned his own small business at Sariab Quetta; He was picked up by the agencies of Pakistan form his shop. He is also in his late 50s of 60 year of age. 3. Haji Gull Jan Marri arrested November 2005 still missing He also runs his own business, and was arrested form his home in Quetta. Hes 80 years of age. His family members have submitted application to the court as well but no repose of relieve form court yet. 4. Mir Mitha Khan Marri arrested December 2005 still missing Mir Mitha khan was arrested form HUB Balochistan along with his other four friends. Hes about 40 year old. His friends are missing too.

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5. Mir Asghar Khan Marri arrested 28/01/2006 still missing He was arrested from Dera Ghazi Khan Punjab, after he addressed a press conference against the on going military operation. His only fault is that he spoke against the military ruler and their action in Balochistan. Hes in his late 40s. 6. Gull khan Bugti arrested 29/01/2006 still missing He was arrested form some surrounding areas of Sibi Balochistan while we was on visit to at his friends. 7. Rab Nawaz Marri arrested 09/02/2006 under custody He was arrested form Bala DahaKa area of Kohlu Balochistan. Currently he is under custody of Kohlu police, but has not been charge with any crime neither has he been presented to any court of law. 8. Mir Misry Khan Marri arrested 03/02/2006 still missing He was arrested along with his driver when he was on his way back home .He is a senior education officer in Kalat Balochistan, hes also the brother of Nazim ( district counsel) of Kohlu Marri agency, Mir Ali gull Marri. His brother Ali gull Marri has recently told BBC that he is extremely worried about his brothers condition. He feared that the Pakistani agencies might have killed his brother by now. 9. Allah Dad Marri arrested 18/02/2006 under custody This innocent man a father of three and a daily wages worker was arrested form Faisal colony DALBANDIN Balochistan, from his home. He was a picked up by an MI official named Major RAZA. Hes been under the custody of MI, ATF, and AGENCIES for two months. He was then transfer to an unknown location like all others who are still missing Two days after his arrest on 20/02/06 his brother had a press conference which is still on record people protest against his arrest in Khuzdar, Noshki, and even Daalbandin, also on record. His own children have recorded their protest in front of Quetta press club, still on record. His brother appealed to the Balochistan high court against his abduction, and then the high ask the SHO Daalbandin to answer. SHO Dalbandin came to the court and says that he's not under their custody but he's been abducted by the MI men. The honourable court then issued a notice to agencies to produce Allah Dad Marri to the court of law on 25/04/06. That's why before going to court they dumped Allah Dad on police, and the police have just change his name from Allah dad to Haji Khan to make the court and public fool. The recovery of arms and explosives in Mastung is a drama its only to label that innocent man, and punish him for undone crimes. 10. In February 2006 14 people were arrested form HUB Balochistan by the Pakistani police and FC men. Some of them were later released after sever torture for their undone crimes, 11. In same moth, in a separate operation against Baloch people living in Hub Balochistan the Pakistani so called law enforcement agencies raided house of innocent people and arrest the following men. 12. Nwafir, Ali Akbar, Ghulam Mustafa, Qadir Bux, Mohammed Jan, Lal Mohammed, Hosha Khan, Abdul Majeed, Gull Mohammed, and Saleh Khan were arrested.

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These above named people are still missing and they belong to very poor families all are daily wages workers or have their own small business. Note: Lal Mohammed is a primary school teacher working with an NGO called BLLF. 13. Haji Raheem Marri, Ameen Marri, and Mir Hazar Khan Marri all arrest on 20/02/2006, from HUB Balochistan. 14. 12 other Marri Baloch were arrested form Shah Norani Karachi, their names are not confirmed yet. 15. Jamal Khan Marri and Chacha Marri arrested from Sibi, 21/02/2006 are still missing. 16. 20/02/2006: the Pakistani police and FC raided a Marri populated area and arrested dozens of people including elderly and children. It must be reminded all these people were daily wages worker and belonged to very poor families. Still no mercy on them by the most corrupt police or the world (Pakistani police). 17. 04/03/2006: Police and other so called law enforcement agencies have raid many shops of Marri people and arrested 14 shopkeepers and other small business owner. The police didnt even let them closed their shops. Their shops and other stuff were looted afterwards. 18. 10/03/2006: Saeed Brohi Baloch was arrested form Wara area of Karachi. The same day Mr Rauf Sasoli Baloch and Qadir Baloch were arrested form a different areas of Karachi named Korangi and Lyari. 19. 10/03/2006: again on same day three other innocent Baloch namely Mohammed Saleem, Mehrab Khan, and Esa Khan were arrested form Nawa Land Lyari in Karachi. 20. Uknown date 2006: Tor Khan Marri a govt laves was arrested from Sibi Balochistan, he was even arrested form the govt office when he went to collect his wages. 21. Date not known 2006: Ibrahim Baloch, Bakshi Baloch and Sleh Mohammed Baloch were area form Mand area of Balochistan and transfer to undisclosed place they are missing since then.

Missing Activists and their Children and families on Strike

In Front of Karachi and Quetta Press Clubs

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Abduction of Mr. Munir Mengal, the M D of Baloch voice TV Channel Mr. Munir Mengal has been abducted by Pakistani secret agencies on 4th April, 2006, from Karachi international airport, while he reached there from Bahrain. Mr. Munir Mengal is a Chartered Accountant, and had been working in State Bank of Pakistan, WAPDA and other corporations in Pakistan. Than he left his job and planned to launch a TV channel in Balochi language. He has been working on the project of TV channel named "Baloch Voice" for more than 8 months. He is abducted only because he wanted to establish a TV channel which would broadcast atrocities of Pakistani state authorities against Baloch nation. Several times their family members expressed the difficulties and desperation of not knowing if their loved ones are being tortured and whether they ever see them again. It is believed that the detainees are being moved form site to site to evade public knowledge, inhuman ways are being to used to extract information, usually through torture and ill- treatment. We believe that holding detainees alone in dark cell 0.9 meters long by 1.8 meters deep by 2.1 meters high is torture, as is beating they receive. When people are held in secret detention and the authorities refuse to disclose their fate or whereabouts they are described as have been "disappeared" such "disappearances" often go hand-in -hand with torture and ill-treatment. Family member of those who have been "disappeared" are themselves being illtreated when deliberately deprived of any information and are desperate for news. I believe While the government practice "disappearances may erase someone form society for a time, but the memory of the person cannot be erased. This memory is what spurs family, friends, and activists to search for them, no matter what. Eventually the truth comes out. I strongly believe that torture does happen in Pakistani jail, it continues to happen, and it destroys lives, as medical experts say torture is KILLING a person without letting him die

In Pakistani secret dungeons, Baluch prisoners are told that they have no right to meet anyone, to see a lawyer, to do anything except what the police tell them. It was revealed when one prisoner asked for a lawyer and he was punched, kicked in stomach, and handcuffed squatting and struck with a foreign object more then 10 times with his shirt on and off. He was also threatened with amputation or beheading; and he was whipped, he estimated 20 or more time, while chained to the floor in crouching position with full back and neck exposed. Later on he testified that, he told a magistrate court that he wanted a lawyer and had been mistreated and that the magistrate responded. "I'll ask the officials", and hand him over back to police. Afterward, the Pakistani police accused him of "making them look bad" (in court) and shackled his hands to a chain hanging form the ceiling for several hours.

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What is our peoples crime is only that they are asking for their Rights to selfdetermination which the fundamental rights of every human being. I may take the opportunity to quote the following paragraph of the General Assembly resolution The right to self-determination of people under colonial or alien domination or foreign occupation to freely determine their political status and freely pursue their economic, social and cultural development is expressly recognized by the General Assembly Resolutions 1514 of 1960 and 2625 of 1970, the 1976 International Covenants of Civil and Political Rights and on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights and the 1993 Viena Declaration adopted by the United Nations World Conference on Human Rights. Abductions of Baloch youth and elderly by Pakistani secret services are a Human Rights emergency. So, we call upon Human rights organizations, and all free born people to take action against the Pakistani authorities who are committing this crime which against all international human rights laws.

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2nd April 2006, in Quetta More then Sixty Thousand Political Activists of Balochistan National Party held a Rally and Procession against Illegal Arrests, Disappearances and Military Operation in Balochistan.

Extreme Torture to Captives Torture is endemic in Pakistan. The United Nations Special Reporter on Torture visited Pakistan in 1997. He concluded: Torture, including rape, and similar cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment are rife in Pakistan, although those with important family, political or international connections are somewhat less at risk of the most extreme forms of torture.8 He observed that allegations he had received throughout his tenure indicated that torture of persons in the custody of the police, the paramilitary and the armed forces was common, widespread and systematic in Pakistan. Human Rights Comission of Pakistan Found the situation extremely alarming and urges the international bodies to pay special attention to this very serious human rights violation, which is being committed with impunity. Regrettably, the courts too have failed to take serious notice of torture and accept it as a common reality. The List of the Baloch Civilian got physically tortured in the custody of Intelligence agencies, Armed forces and Police.

Mir Abdul Nabi Bangulzai Alam Pirkani Baloch Aslam Gurganaree Ali Beig Baloch Eid Muhammad Gul Hasan Marri Baloch Hazal Khan

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Beating of Innocent Villagers of Naag Noor Muhammad Marri Baloch Arrest Of Dr Imdad Baloch and Friends Sorab Baloch Testimony of Dr Imdad Baloch

For Details of Torture Victims visit following Link; http://balochwarna.org/modules/mylinks/visit.php?cid=1&lid=2

Torture and ill-treatment of Baluch prisoner in Pakistani jails Torture by authorities (police, FC and army men- including with electric shocks and cigarette burns continues in Balochistan by Pakistani soldiers. Many cases still do not come to light because police cover up their crimes and detainees are often afraid to complain or identify the perpetrators for fear of repercussions. The methods used to torture and ill-treat Baluch detainees in Pakistani Jails include: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. Electric shocks Putting plastic bags over the heads of detainees Suspending a detainee from a pole between two tables Cigarette and candle burns Placing the barrel of a gun in a detainee's mouth threatening to shoot Treats to beat the detainee's family Gagging the detainees with a piece of cloth so they cannot shout Kicking and beating, including with truncheons and butts of guns

The tools Pakistan Army and its Intelligence Agencies are using in illegal detention centres and in Torture cells in Quetta.

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Dr Allah Nazar Baluch who was arrested on 24th of March 2005, reportedly beaten by police, army men and currently serving prison in a Quetta jail in Balochistan, said that the police and agency men started to beat me. They took legs of a chair and hit me on the finger of my left hand. During the beating another police officer and a procurator entered and started to accuse me of working for Baloch militant groups. One officer threatened to beat my children and family unless I confess to what they want to confess. During beating I lost consciousness several times. Blood was coming from my mouth and I couldn't see properly. As I was suffering form illness previously and couldn't afford more torture. I did not ask for a doctor at first because I was afraid, Even if I had asked for a doctor they would beat me and swear at me (calling me with bad name etc).

Before Torture

After Torture (Dr. Allah Nazar)

November18, 2005 at about 7pm Balochistan Time Dr Hanif Shareef, has been kidnapped by Pakistani secret agencies from Turbat, where he was setting with his friends in a restaurant near to his quarter. Dr Hanif Shareef is a fresh graduate of Bolan Medical College, 2004, practicing his job in a government Basic Health Unit in Zarren Bog Dasht. He enters the Balochi literature field as a short story writer and he achieved a high place in Balochi literature in a very short period.

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AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL STATEMENT AND URGENT APPEALS ON BALOCHISTAN MILITARY OPERATION AND MASS DISAPPEARANCES.

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AMNESTY Internationals latest report on Balochistan

Public Statement AI Index: ASA 33/004/2006 (Public) News Service No: 038 10 February 2006 Pakistan: Allegations of serious human rights violations in Balochistan must be investigated Amnesty International is concerned about reports of human rights violations in Balochistan province which have escalated in the last two months. Recent violations have occurred in the context of a security operation in the province triggered by an attempt on President Pervez Musharraf's life in December 2005. However the current intensification of tensions also flows from long-standing grievances felt by the local population in relation to severe economic underdevelopment and failures to receive the benefits of large-scale exploitation of the province's natural resources. A non-governmental Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP) report released in late January 2006 found scores of cases of arbitrary arrests and detention, torture, extrajudicial executions, disappearances and use of excessive force by security and intelligence forces committed since early 2005. Amongst the victims are women, children and many political activists. In addition, the Commission noted with concern that armed Baloch fighters opposing the army's presence in the province have laid landmines as a result of which civilians have been indiscriminately killed and maimed. Though Amnesty International has not been in a position to visit Balochistan to investigate these allegations of human rights violations, the organisation considers the findings of the HRCP's report to be credible, and strongly supports the Commission's demand that human rights abuses be stopped forthwith and that all allegations of violations of human rights, including civil, political and economic rights, be independently and impartially investigated with a view to bringing the perpetrators to justice. Amnesty International also appeals to all armed fighters and armed groups to abide by international humanitarian law, in particular the rules that are binding on all parties to a non-international armed conflict. These rules prohibit, inter alia, torture, hostage-taking, deliberate killing of civilians and other non-combatants and indiscriminate attacks. The findings of the HRCP fact-finding mission corroborate a large number of reports received by Amnesty International from Baloch activists and civil society organisations since early 2005. According to a January 2006 statement by Senator Sanaullah Baloch, at least 180 people have died in bombings, 122 children have been killed by paramilitary troops and hundreds of people have been arrested since the beginning of the campaign in early 2005. On 8 December 2005, the federal Interior Minister stated that some 4,000 people had been arrested in Balochistan since the beginning of 2005. The identities, whereabouts of and charges against many of these detainees remain unknown. Having

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monitored some of these cases of detention and "disappearance", Amnesty International fears that some of the detainees may have been arbitrarily detained, or held under preventive detention legislation or on politically motivated criminal charges, in violation of Pakistan statutory law and international human rights standards. Since the HRCP concluded its fact-finding visit, further reports of human rights violations have been received. Twelve men, arrested after an attack on a Frontier Corps unit on 11 January 2006, were reportedly extrajudicially executed killed in the Dera Bugti camp of the Frontier Corps when news arrived that three of the injured soldiers had died. Two elderly villagers sent to collect the bodies were also killed. On 16 January 2006, three children were reportedly killed in Kahan by aerial bombardment. On 7 February, a bomb, possibly planted by armed fighters, blew up a bus killing 13 people travelling in it. Amnesty International is also concerned that the fact-finding team of the HRCP and journalists accompanying them were attacked on 8 January 2006 when their cars were fired at for several minutes near Kashmore. Although the HRCP team submitted an application to police in Rojhan to file a complaint, police did not comply nor investigate the alleged attempted murder. Journalists have also been arbitrarily detained, harassed and threatened by intelligence agencies if they continued to investigate incidents in Balochistan. Amnesty International believes that it is important that journalists and human rights defenders can pursue their legitimate roles unimpeded and without fear, so that human rights violations can be monitored and brought to public attention, Remedies may then be found to ensure the protection and promotion of human rights in the province. The following human rights violations have been documented by the HRCP: Torture Those who were released after arbitrary detention, often in undeclared places of detention, or "disappearance" reported being subjected to torture and ill-treatment. * Chairman of the Balochistan Student Organisation (BSO) Dr Imdad Baloch and six other BSO activists were arrested on 25 March 2005 in Karachi after a rally protesting the security operation in Balochistan [AI Index: ASA 33/006/2005, AI Index: ASA 33/014/2005 and AI Index: ASA 33/022/2005]. Their whereabouts remained unknown for two months until Dr Imdad Baloch and three others were released on bail two months later, facing politically motivated criminal charges. Dr Imdad Baloch then reported that he and his fellow detainees had been detained incommunicado in solitary confinement for 33 days in Karachi, where they were tortured. He reported being hit on the soles of his feet making him unable to walk and beaten all over his body, including on his kidneys, with leather straps while forced to lie prone in fetters on the ground. The four detainees were then taken to Quetta, where they were kept for 22 days and threatened with death if they continued to participate in politics. In August 2005, the other three detained BSO members re-appeared in a police station in a village in Punjab province, held on charges of robbery. While the other two were released in November 2005, Dr Allah Nazar, still currently being held in Quetta Central Jail, is reportedly partially paralysed and unable to speak or recognise anyone as a result of torture.

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The constitution of Pakistan provides partial protection against torture in Article 14 which states that "no person shall be subject to torture for the purpose of extracting evidence". International standards and customary international law absolutely forbid torture and other ill-treatment for any purpose. Possible extrajudicial executions and other unlawful killings * On 17 March 2005, some 62 persons, including 33 Hindu women and children were killed at Dera Bugti when Frontier Corps personnel shelled, bombarded and fired at them. *On 17 December 2005, at least 22 persons, mostly women and children, including infants, were killed in bombing, firing and shelling by armed forces in the Marri area of Jabbar and Pekal, apparently in retribution for rocket attacks on 14 December on a paramilitary camp on the outskirts of Kohlu during a visit by President Musharraf and on 15 December on a helicopter carrying the Inspector General of the Frontier Corps. The use of force must be in line with the principles of necessity and proportionality included in international standards on the use of force by law enforcement officials. These stipulate that lethal force may only be used in response to the imminent threat of death or serious injury when strictly unavoidable and that the use of force must minimise damage and injury and respect and preserve human life both of the suspects and uninvolved persons. Extrajudicial executions are strictly prohibited under the Constitution of Pakistan which in Article 9 provides, "No person shall be deprived of life and liberty, save in accordance with law". The Universal Declaration of Human Rights provides in Article 3, "Everyone has the right to life, liberty and security of the person". The Principles of the Effective Prevention and Investigation of Extra-legal, Arbitrary and Summary Executions provide that"Exceptional circumstances including a state of war or threat of war, internal political instability or any other public emergency may not be invoked as a justification of such executions". "Disappearances" Since May 2005, Amnesty International has issued a series of urgent actions relating to some of the large number of reported disappearances in Balochistan. The organisation fears that people who are "disappeared" are particularly at risk of torture as perpetrators feel safe in the knowledge that their actions will not be made known and that they will not face criminal charges *On 9 December 2005, 18 members of the Pakistan Petroleum Workers' Union from Balochistan who had gone to Karachi for negotiations with their management were detained by security forces from their hotel. Their whereabouts remain unknown. *Dr Hanned Shareef, a writer, medical doctor and member of the BSO was arrested on 18 November 2005 in Turbat by men in the uniform of the paramilitary Frontier Corps. State officials have refused to confirm that he has been arrested. When his family members attempted to file a complaint against the Frontier Corps soldiers involved, police at the Turbat city police station refused to accept it [AI Index: ASA 33/032/2005].

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International standards and human rights guarantees in the Constitution of Pakistan absolutely prohibit disappearances. The Constitution of Pakistan provides in Article 10 that every detainee has the right to be informed of the charges against them, to consult and be defended by a lawyer of their choice and be brought before a magistrate within 24 hours of arrest. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights provides in Article 7: "All are equal before the law and are entitled without any discrimination to equal protection of the law ...". These provisions guarantee that everyone including those persons who may be suspected of offences against the state have a right to be treated in accordance with law and not to be discriminated against on that account. Background

In Balochistan, the perception of the local population that they have not benefited from the exploitation of the extensive natural resources of the province, and their resentment at the slow pace of provincial economic development and the influx of people from other provinces, have led to social and political tensions. Four waves of violent unrest took place in 1948, 1958-59, 1962-63 and 1973-77. In early 2005, tensions in Balochistan again increased, with numerous clashes reported between security forces and Baloch tribesmen. The rape in early January 2005 of Dr Shazia Khalid, a young doctor employed at Pakistan Petroleum Limited at Sui, allegedly by an army officer, who was publicly exonerated by President Musharraf prior to any inquiry, exacerbated anger among the tribal population. Following a rocket attack on President Musharraf on 14 December 2005 during his visit to Kohlu, when he announced a large development package for the region including the construction of roads, schools and health centres, a security operation, assisted by paramilitary units, was launched in the province. While the government portrays it as a law and order operation against "miscreants", that is Baloch rebels, local people see it as a crackdown on Baloch opponents of a development program which will only benefit nonBaloch people migrating into the province. The government claims that the resistance is encouraged by tribal leaders who fear losing their hold on the region. The confrontation between Baloch nationalists and the state is complicated by rivalries and strategic alliances between tribes and sub-tribes and by human rights abuses committed by all sides. http://web.amnesty.org/library/Index/ENGASA330042006?open&of=ENG-PAK

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URGENT ACTION

5 May 2005

Pakistan: Fear for Safety/"Disappearance" PUBLIC AI Index: ASA 33/006/2005 UA 111/05 Fear for Safety/"Disappearance" 05 May 2005 PAKISTAN Imdad Baloch (m) ] Yusuf Baloch (m) ] Ghulam Rasool Allah Nazar (m)] Members of the Baloch Students Organisation Naseem Baloch (m) ] Nawaz Ali (m) ] Akhter Nadeem (m) ] Amnesty International is concerned for the safety of the members of the Baloch Students Organisation named above who were reportedly arrested with several others in the city of Karachi during the early hours of 25 March. They are detained incommunicado at an unknown location and may be subjected to torture, cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment. The men are feared "disappeared" and it is unclear whether local police or intelligence agencies were responsible for their arrest. They have not appeared before a court and local police have denied their detention. The Baloch Students Organisation is a group that is active is highlighting the plight of the Baloch people. They have campaigned on issues including recent allegations of the unlawful killing of villagers by the military in Balochistan. They have also campaigned on the longer standing issue of access to resources such as gas. Balochistan hosts the countrys primary gas installation yet the residents of this province have little access to this resource. Amnesty International believes that the continued disappearance of members of the Baloch Students Organisation violates a number of human rights guaranteed in the Constitution of Pakistan and international human rights standards. The Constitution of Pakistan states in Article 9: No person shall be deprived of life and liberty, save in accordance with law. It lays down in Article 10 that every detainee has the right to be informed of the charges against them, to consult and be defended by a lawyer of their choice and be brought before a magistrate within 24 hours of arrest. None of these requirements have been fulfilled in this case. AI Index: ASA 33/006/2005 5 May 2005

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08 June 200
URGENT ACTION

Pakistan: Further information on Fear for Safety/"Disappearance" PUBLIC AI Index: ASA 33/014/2005 08 June 2005 Further Information on UA 111/05 (ASA 33/006/2005, 05 May 2005) Fear for Safety/ "Disappearance" PAKISTAN Nawaz Ali (m) ] Akhter Nadeem (m) ] Released: Imdad Baloch (m) ] Members of the Baloch Students Organisation Yusuf Baloch (m) ] Ghulam Rasool Allah Nazar (m) ] Naseem Baloch (m) ] Imdad Baloch, Yusuf Baloch, Ghulam Rasool and Naseem Baloch were reportedly released on 24 May 2005. They had been detained incommunicado for two months, along with Nawaz Ali and Akhter Nadeem, and were reportedly tortured. Nawaz Ali and Akhter Nadeem are still detained at an unknown location and remain at risk of torture, cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment. The six men, all members of the Baloch Students Organisation, were arrested in the city of Karachi on 25 March 2005. Since his release Imdad Baloch has stated how following their arrest, himself, Yusuf Baloch, Ghulam Rasool and Naseem Baloch were detained incommunicado in solitary confinement for 33 days in Karachi, where they were tortured. Their hands and feet were shackled and their heads were covered. The four were then reportedly taken to the city of Quetta in the province of Balochistan, where they were kept for 22 days and threatened with death if they continued to participate in politics. They were finally taken to a police station in the town of Dera Ghazi Khan, in the state of Punjab, where their head coverings were removed and they realised that Nawaz Ali and Akhter Nadeem were not with them. The four men were produced in court on 24 May and released on bail; the charges pending against them remain unclear. Imdad Baloch also stated that in all three places

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where he was held, he heard the screams of prisoners being tortured in nearby cells. The Baloch Students Organisation is a group that is active in highlighting the plight of the Baloch people. They have campaigned on issues including recent allegations of the unlawful killing of villagers by the military in Balochistan. They have also campaigned on the longer standing issue of access to resources such as gas. Balochistan hosts the countrys primary gas installation yet the residents of this province have little access to this resource. AI Index: ASA 33/014/2005 8 June 2005

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17 August 2005
URGENT ACTION

Pakistan: Further information on: Fear for Safety/"Disappearance"


PUBLIC AI Index: ASA 33/022/2005 17 August 2005 Further Information on UA 111/05 (ASA 33/006/2005, 05 May 2005) and follow-up (ASA 33/014/2005, 8 June 2005) - Fear for Safety/ Disappearance/ New concerns: Torture/ Medical concern PAKISTAN Ali Nawaz (m) ] Akhter Nadeem (m) ] Members of the Baloch Students Organization New name: Dr. Allah Nazar (m) ] Ali Nawaz, Akhter Nadeem and Dr. Allah Nazar are reportedly being held in a police station in the village of Chandar Maa which is about 25km from the city of Sadiq Abad, Punjab province. They have reportedly been tortured and require medical treatment. The three, who are all are members of the Baloch Students Organisation, had 'disappeared' since their arrest in Karachi on 25 March, along with four others who were later released. On 13 August they were produced before a court in the city of Sadiq Abad in relation to an alleged case of robbery. They were then returned to the police station in the village of Chandar Maa, where they were able to meet with their families for ten minutes. The families have reported that all three men were tortured using electric shocks. There is particular concern for Dr. Allah Nazar who is partially paralysed and reportedly unable to speak or recognise anyone as result of being tortured. His family have expressed concern that his injuries may result in complete paralysis unless he receives immediate medical treatment in hospital.

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However, the authorities have reportedly denied the men access to medical treatment. The men reportedly appeared again in front of the same court on 17 August in relation to the alleged case of robbery and may possibly be handed over to authorities in Balochistan in connection with another case. Should this happen, there is a risk that they may disappear or be subjected to further ill-treatment and torture. BACKGROUND INFORMATION The Baloch Students Organisation is a group that is active in highlighting the plight of the Baloch people. They have campaigned on issues including recent allegations of the unlawful killing of villagers by the military in Balochistan. They have also campaigned on the longer standing issue of access to resources such as gas. Balochistan hosts the countrys primary gas installation yet the residents of this province have little access to this resource.

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26 August 2005
URGENT ACTION

Pakistan: Further information on Fear for Safety/"Disappearance"/ Torture/ Medical concern PUBLIC AI Index: ASA 33/024/2005 26 August 2005 Further Information on UA 111/05 (ASA 33/006/2005, 05 May 2005) and follow-ups (ASA 33/014/2005, 8 June 2005, and ASA 33/022/2005, 17 August 2005) Fear for safety/ "Disappearance"/ Torture/ Medical concern PAKISTAN Nawaz Ali (m) ] Akhter Nadeem (m) ] Members of the Baloch Students Organisation Dr Allah Nazar (m) ] Dr Allah Nazar has reportedly been held in solitary confinement in the Jail Ward of Sandeman Provincial Hospital (also known as Civil Hospital), in the city of Quetta, Balochistan, since 21 August. His lawyer, relatives and other visitors have been denied access to him. It is unclear whether he is receiving any medical treatment in the Jail Ward, even though he was reportedly in a critical condition when he was admitted to hospital. On 17 August, the authorities in the city of Sadiq Abad, Punjab province handed Dr Allah Nazar, Akhter Nadeem and Nawaz Ali over to police in Balochistan. It is not known exactly where they were taken as they were not presented before a court and their families were not informed of their whereabouts. However, according to a local newspaper, they may have been detained in a police station in the town of Dera Murad, Balochistan. The current whereabouts of Akhter Nadeem and Nawaz Ali are unknown. Several local press articles have reported claims made by Sadiq Umrani, the leader of the political group, the Peoples Party, that he met Dr Allah Nazar while he was detained at Dera Murad police station. Sadiq Umrani alleged that Dr Allah Nazar was forced to drink a salt-like drug which burned his

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throat, causing him to feel ill, and he has since found it painful to eat. Dr Allah Nazar is also partially paralysed and reportedly unable to speak or recognize anyone as a result of being tortured, including with electric shocks. On 20 August, the Baloch Students Organization received information that members of the security forces had taken Dr Allah Nazar to the Bolan Medical Complex Hospital in Quetta for a medical check-up. He was then examined by a senior neurosurgeon, who reportedly said that Dr Allah Nazar was in a critical condition, and should be admitted to hospital immediately. He was admitted to Sandeman Provincial Hospital on the same day. Relatives of other patients at the hospital have reported that the uniformed men who brought Dr Allah Nazar to the hospital threatened the doctor who was treating him, ordering him to make a report stating that Dr Allah Nazar did not need to be admitted to the hospital. BACKGROUND INFORMATION The Baloch Students Organisation is a group that is active in highlighting the plight of the Baloch people. They have campaigned on issues including recent allegations of the unlawful killing of villagers by the military in Balochistan. They have also campaigned on the longer standing issue of access to resources such as gas. Balochistan hosts the countrys primary gas installation yet the residents of this province have little access to this resource.

AI Index: ASA 33/024/2005

26 August 2005

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26 October 2005 URGENT ACTION Pakistan: Further information on fear for Safety/"Disappearance"/ Torture/Medical concern PUBLIC AI Index: ASA 33/029/2005 26 October 2005 Further Information on UA 111/05 (ASA 33/006/2005, 05 May 2005) and follow-ups (ASA 33/014/2005, 8 June 2005, ASA 33/022/2005, 17 August 2005; and ASA 33/024/2005, 26 August 2005) - Fear for safety/"Disappearance"/Torture/Medical concern PAKISTAN Nawaz Ali (m) ] Akhter Nadeem (m) ] Members of the Baloch Students Dr Allah Nazar (m) ] Organisation (BSO) Rearrested: Dr Yusuf Baloch (m), member of the BSO New names: 16 members of the BSO Dr Yusuf Baloch, a member of the Baloch Students Organisation (BSO), was rearrested in the town of Turbat in Balochistan on 10 October. He is being held in solitary confinement in Turbat Police Station, where he has been visited by other members of the BSO. The reason for Yusuf Baloch's rearrest is unknown. He was previously detained incommunicado for two months earlier this year, when he was reportedly tortured. He is at risk of torture or illtreatment in detention. Amnesty International has also learnt that 16 other members of the BSO are being held in Turbat Central Jail and have reportedly been severely beaten. The detainees, all men, were arrested in Turbat on 7 and 8 August, after taking part in a protest against the continued detention of BSO members including Dr Allah Nazar, Nawaz Ali and Akhter Nadeem. It is not known if they have been charged with any offence.

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BSO members Dr Allah Nazar, Nawaz Ali and Akhter Nadeem have been detained since 25 March, apparently in connection with an alleged robbery. The charges against them are unclear. Dr Allah Nazar has been held in the Jail Ward of the Sandeman Provincial Hospital (also known as the Civil Hospital) in the city of Quetta, Balochistan, since 21 August. According to the BSO, he is still being denied access to adequate medical treatment for injuries he sustained during torture. Hospital authorities have permitted him to see a few visitors. Some of these visitors have reported that Dr Allah Nazar is suffering from severe pain in his chest and stomach and remains paralysed on the left hand side of his head and in his left leg. He also allegedly finds it difficult to stand up as a result of having being beaten on his stomach and lower body. He is being held under the Maintenance of Public Order Ordinance (MPO), but it is unclear whether any charges are pending against him. Nawaz Ali and Akhter Nadeem are being held in a police station in Quetta, and are at risk of physical and mental torture. They were detained incommunicado at an unknown location for several months. In September, Amnesty International received information that they were being held in Quetta, where their families have been able to visit them. BACKGROUND INFORMATION The Baloch Students Organisation is a group that is active in highlighting the plight of the Baloch people. They have campaigned on issues including recent allegations of the unlawful killing of villagers by the military in Balochistan. They have also campaigned on the longer standing issue of access to resources such as gas. Balochistan hosts the countrys primary gas installation yet the residents of this province have little access to this resource.

AI Index: ASA 33/029/2005

26 October 2005

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URGENT ACTION

9 December 2005

Pakistan: "Disappearance"/Fear of torture: Dr Haneef Shareef (m) PUBLIC AI Index: ASA 33/032/2005 09 December 2005 UA 309/05 "Disappearance"/Fear of torture PAKISTAN Dr Haneef Shareef (m) Dr Haneef Shareef, a member of the Balochistan Students' Organisation (BSO), was arrested on 18 November. The authorities have not acknowledged his arrest, and his whereabouts are now unknown. As a BSO member he is in grave danger of torture. A writer and medical doctor, he was reportedly sitting with some friends in a restaurant by his house in the city of Turbat, Balochistan, when at around 7pm five armed men in the uniform of the paramilitary Frontier Corps got out of a white pick-up truck and asked Dr Haneef to go with them, without giving a reason. According to witnesses they took him to a nearby Frontier Corps camp. State officials have refused to confirm that he has been arrested. When his family members attempted to file a complaint against the Frontier Corps soldiers involved, police at the Turbat city police station refused to accept it. BACKGROUND INFORMATION The BSO is active in highlighting the plight of the Baloch people, who live mainly in the south-western province of Balochistan and have historically been excluded from the benefits of resource development in the area. They have campaigned for the Baloch people to receive a greater share of the revenue from the natural gas produced in the region: the province houses Pakistan's main gas plant, but local people receive little benefit from it. Baloch armed groups have attacked military installations in protest at this, and in retaliation the army have allegedly killed a number of villagers. The BSO have campaigned on these alleged unlawful killings.

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09 December 2005 URGENT ACTION

Pakistan: Further information on fear for safety/"disappearance"/ torture/medical concern PUBLIC AI Index: ASA 33/031/2005 09 December 2005 Further Information on UA 111/05 (ASA 33/006/2005, 5 May 2005) and followups (ASA 33/014/2005, 8 June 2005; ASA 33/022/2005, 17 August 2005; ASA 33/024/2005, 26 August 2005; ASA 33/029/2005, 26 October 2005) Fear for Safety/"Disappearance"/Torture/Medical concern PAKISTAN Nawaz Ali (m) ] Members of the Baloch Students Akhter Nadeem (m) ] Organization (BSO) Dr Allah Nazar (m) ] Dr Yusuf Baloch (m), BSO member 16 members of the BSO Dr Allah Nazar is now held in Turbat District Jail, Balochistan. It is not clear whether he is receiving adequate medical care, and he is still suffering the after-effects of torture, but as he is now in judicial custody, he is at much less risk of torture than he was in police custody. On 1 December he was flown to Turbat in a military aeroplane and produced in front of the Makran regional Anti-Terrorist Court, reportedly to face a murder charge which his lawyer says is fabricated. It is not known when his trial will begin. Fourteen of the 16 BSO members arrested in Turbat on 7 and 8 August were released on 1 November. Majed Samad Baloch and Fazal Karim Baloch are still in custody and have been sentenced to one year's imprisonment each on charges of sedition and public disorder. Both men remain in custody at Turbat District Jail. They are filing an appeal. Their lawyer says they are not being tortured or ill-treated. Akhter Nadeem and Nawaz Ali were released without charge on 2 November. Dr Yusuf Baloch was released on 19 November.

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Members of the BSO have welcomed the support given to these cases by Amnesty International and have asked us to pass on their thanks to all who have campaigned on their behalf. No further action is requested from the UA network. Many thanks to all who sent appeals. The International Secretariat will continue to monitor the cases of Dr Allah Nazar, Akhter Nadeem and Nawaz Ali and in particular urge prison authorities in Turbat to ensure proper medical care for Dr Nazar.********

AI Index: ASA 33/031/2005

9 December 2005

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09 December 2005

URGENT ACTION

Pakistan: Further information on fear for safety/"disappearance"/ torture/medical concern PUBLIC AI Index: ASA 33/031/2005 09 December 2005 Further Information on UA 111/05 (ASA 33/006/2005, 5 May 2005) and followups (ASA 33/014/2005, 8 June 2005; ASA 33/022/2005, 17 August 2005; ASA 33/024/2005, 26 August 2005; ASA 33/029/2005, 26 October 2005) - Fear for Safety/"Disappearance"/Torture/Medical concern PAKISTAN Nawaz Ali (m) ] Members of the Baloch Students Akhter Nadeem (m) ] Organization (BSO) Dr Allah Nazar (m) ] Dr Yusuf Baloch (m), BSO member 16 members of the BSO Dr Allah Nazar is now held in Turbat District Jail, Balochistan. It is not clear whether he is receiving adequate medical care, and he is still suffering the after-effects of torture, but as he is now in judicial custody, he is at much less risk of torture than he was in police custody. On 1 December he was flown to Turbat in a military aeroplane and produced in front of the Makran regional Anti-Terrorist Court, reportedly to face a murder charge which his lawyer says is fabricated. It is not known when his trial will begin. Fourteen of the 16 BSO members arrested in Turbat on 7 and 8 August were released on 1 November. Majed Samad Baloch and Fazal Karim Baloch are still in custody and have been sentenced to one year's imprisonment each on charges of sedition and public disorder. Both men remain in custody at Turbat District Jail. They are filing an appeal. Their lawyer says they are not being

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Akhter Nadeem and Nawaz Ali were released without charge on 2 November. Dr Yusuf Baloch was released on 19 November. Members of the BSO have welcomed the support given to these cases by Amnesty International and have asked us to pass on their thanks to all who have campaigned on their behalf. No further action is requested from the UA network. Many thanks to all who sent appeals. The International Secretariat will continue to monitor the cases of Dr Allah Nazar, Akhter Nadeem and Nawaz Ali and in particular urge prison authorities in Turbat to ensure proper medical care for Dr Nazar.

AI Index: ASA 33/031/2005

9 December 2005

You can reach on Amnesty International Urgent Appeals Regarding Disappearances in Balochistan on following sites.
http://web.amnesty.org/library/Index/ENGASA330322005?open&of=ENG-PAK http://web.amnesty.org/library/Index/ENGASA330312005?open&of=ENG-PAK http://web.amnesty.org/library/Index/ENGASA330042006?open&of=ENG-PAK http://web.amnesty.org/library/Index/ENGASA330112006?open&of=ENG-PAK http://web.amnesty.org/library/Index/ENGASA330152006?open&of=ENG-PAK

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SECURITY CONCERNS

Fear and Threat to Baloch Political Leaders


URGENT APPEALS OF BALOCH LEADERS TO INTERNATIONAL COMMUNITY Travel ban on Baloch nationalist Leaders NAMES OF BALOCH LEADERS PLACED ON EXIT CONTROLL LIST BY MILITARY RULERS ECL LETTER SAMPLES ISSUED TO FORMER CHIEF MINISTER OF BALOCHISTAN AND HEAD OF BNP AND SENATOR SANAULLAH BALOCH MEMBER SENATE OF PAKISTAN NEWS CLIPPINGS OF BNP PRESIDENT AKHATAR MENGAL HOUSE SIEGE

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Baloch leaders put on ECL


By Our Staff Correspondent

QUETTA, April 30: The interior ministry has placed the names of a number of Baloch nationalist leaders, including Nawab Khair Bakhsh Mari, Sardar Ataullah Mengal on the exit control list. According to official sources, those barred from travelling abroad include Balochistan National Party chief Akhtar Mengal, BNP Senator Sanaullah Baloch and MNA Abdul Rauf Mengal, Senator Agha Shahid Bugti of the Jamhoori Watan Party, JWP leader Amanullah Kanrani, Dera Bugti District Nazim Mohammad Kazim Bugti, Kohlu District Nazim Ali Gul Mari and Mir Sher Ali Mazari, nephew of Nawab Akbar Bugti. The sources said that the ministry through a memorandum had informed the leaders about their names having been put on the ECL. Yes, I and other nationalist leaders have been put on the ECL, Senator Sanaullah confirmed to Dawn over telephone from London where he is attending a conference. He said he had received a letter from the ministry in this regard. Terming the move a violation of basic rights and the Constitution, he said that through such tactics, the government would not be able to force the Baloch leaders to abandon the struggle for the legitimate rights of the people of Balochistan.

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PPPP condemns putting Baloch leaders on


ECLhttp://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2006%5C05%5C03%5Cstory_3-5-2006_pg7_16

ISLAMABAD: The Pakistan Peoples Party Parliamentarians (PPPP) criticised the governments decision to put veteran Baloch politicians on the exit control list (ECL), declaring it a breach of the privilege of parliament members and vowed to raise the matter in Senate. The placing of the names of politicians, including parliamentarians from Balochistan, on the ECL is condemned in the strongest terms. The use of Section 2 of the Exit from Pakistan Control Ordinance, 1981, is shackling their rights as guaranteed under the constitution, Senator Mian Raza Rabbani said. He said that the governments act showed that it had no respect for the law or the constitution because even under the said ordinance, the reasons and grounds had to be communicated and served with the order. Rabbani said that it was a matter of concern that Senator Sanaullah Baloch, Senator Shahid Bugti, former Senator Amanullah Kanarani and MNA Rauf Mengal were also put on the ECL. He said that by placing the names of veteran Baloch leaders and two district nazims, the government was not moving towards a political solution for the problems in Balochistan. The government has also failed in implementing the recommendations of the parliamentary committee that was constituted by the prime minister, he added. As the government has not denied any of the reports appearing in the national press, this is indeed a serious situation that has arisen in the province and neither the people nor parliament has been taken into confidence. The prime minister is on notice to explain the matter. This issue will also be raised in Senate, he said. staff report

Friday, April 28, 2006

Baloch websites banned


Daily Times Monitor LAHORE: The PTA stopped access to four Baloch websites carrying material about Baloch nationalists, BBC reported on Thursday. The PTA cited misinformation as the reason for banning the websites, reported BBC. The banned sites are: www.balochvoice.com, www.baloch2000.org, www.sanabaloch.com and www. balochfront.com

http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2006\04\28\story_28-42006_pg7_5

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To; All Concerned Human Rights Organizations From; Members Parliament of Balochistan Province of Pakistan

Subject: Urgent Appeal of Parliamentarians of Balochistan, Pakistan Against Inclusion of Names in Exist Control List and Military Operation Excellency, I write to you to convey the sentiments of the people of Balochistan, a province of Pakistan that has been much in the news lately because of the on-going military operation by military and central government to suppress the aspirations of the people. Balochistan is Pakistans largest and natural resource rich province and yet the least developed. The people of the province have historically seen the riches of their land exploited not for their benefit but for that of the dominant province of Punjab. The practice continues today. Whenever the people of Balochistan have raised their voice demanding their just rights, including the utilization of the provinces resources for their welfare, their voices have been stifled by the military might of the state of Pakistan. Baloch history since the creation of Pakistan is replete with instances of the tanks and gunship helicopter and fighter jets deployed by the aggressive Pakistans army against the innocent masses of Balochistan. We , who believe that democracy demands that people be allowed not merely to express their aspirations but to protest when their basic and fundamental rights are usurped, have been seeking to impress upon the government of Pakistan the need to undertake immediate political consultations with the leadership of the Baloch people. The people of the province want an end to the senseless state violence that has been impacting the economic and social life of the province. As democrats we believe that all problems and conflicts between people can be resolved through a process of serious, sincere and meaningful political dialogue. In Balochistan people have been subjected to severe human rights violations ranging from disappearances, torture, killings, illegal detainment and arrests of civil and political activists. In addition, intelligence agencies have created an environment of fear, insecurity in the region, and several political activists and members of political parties including parliamentarians have been subjected to denial of access, freedom of speech and movement against those opposing the exploitation of resources, killing of civilians and military operation in the region. Eventually, the Baloch Political leaders and elected Parliamentarians have been denied freedom of movement, and their names have been placed on Exist Control list (ECL) by the Ministry of Interior, Government of Pakistan (Annex A lists the names of members on ECL). We have appealed to the international community to persuade the military-led Government of Pakistan to halt the wanton massacre of innocent men, women and children and listen to what to what the people of Balochistan are saying since the accession of their land with Pakistan.

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All that they have demanded is the right to live in dignity, not to have their welfare ignored and to see their province flourish as an economic powerhouse. But, instead the response of the present military regime has been in keeping with past trends to violently and aggressively crush all democratic protests. I, an elected Senator, Member Parliament of Pakistan and My other Baloch parliamentarian colleagues Mr. Abdul Rauf Mengal (Member National Assembly), Mr. Senator Agha Shaid Bugti, Our Party Head and President of Pakistan Oppressed Nation Moment and Former Chief Minister Sardar Attah Ullah Mengal (80 years old), former chief minister and President of Democratic Party Nawab Akbar Khan Bugti (82 years old), Veteran Baloch politician Nawab Khair Bux Khan Marri (78 years old) and including tow former Senators (Mr. Javed Mengal, Mr. Amanuulah Kanrani, and one Member Provincial Assembly (MPA) Mr. Mir Balach Khan Marri including our family members have been placed on the Exit Control List, denying the right to travel and freedom. In the eyes of Military regime our articulation of the aspiration of our people is a crime for which we are to be confined within the borders of Pakistan turning our country in to PRISON. My personal website www.sanabaloch.com and three other websites have been blocked and my travel rescinded. I have only two options available to me-to live in exile so that I can continue to speak for my people or to return to my homeland and face the consequences. Excellency, we appeal to AHRC to the concerned committee to impress upon the government of Pakistan that stifling the voice of individuals can never stifle the voice of nation. AHRC have always played an important role protecting the basic and democratic rights of individuals and parliamentarians in all around the world. We the members of parliament of Pakistan and particularly Balochistan province have been subjected to arbitrary actions e.g. State harassment, arbitrary arrest and detention, unfair trial, violation of parliamentary immunity. On behalf of people of Balochistan, I Senator Sanaullah Baloch request you to persuade General Musharaf and the Government of Pakistan to listen to respect the international human rights instruments and laws, and stop violation of the rights to movement and freedom of Parliamentarians. Yours Sincerely,
From Members Senate of Pakistan 1. Senator Sanaullah Baloch Member Senate of Pakistan On behalf of Balochistan National Party 2. Senator Dr Abdul malik Baloch Member Senate of Pakistan On behalf of National Party 3. Senator Agha Shaid Bugti Member Senate of Pakistan On behalf of Jamoori Watan Party

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4. Mr. Kachkol Ali Baloch Leader of Opposition Balochistan Provincial Assembly 5. Mr. Nawbzada Balach khan Marri Member, Balochistan Provincial Assembly 6. Mr. Mohammed Akbar Mengal Member, Balochistan Provincial Assembly 7. Mr. Akhatar Hussain lango Member, Balochistan Provincial Assembly 8. Mr. Haji Jummah Khan Bugti Member, Balochistan Provincial Assembly 9. Mr. Saleem koso Member, Balochistan Provincial Assembly 10. Mr. Mumtaz shah Member, Balochistan Provincial Assembly 11. Mr. Jan Mohammed Buledi Member, Balochistan Provincial Assembly 12. Mr. Rhamat Baloch Member, Balochistan Provincial Assembly 13. Mrs. Dr Shama Ishaque Baloch Member, Balochistan Provincial Assembly
Dated: MAY 2006

Note; List with detail is attached.

Sample of ECL Notification;

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Present Members of Parliament of Pakistan on Exit Control List


S.N o

Name Senator Sanaullah Baloch Senator Agha Shaid BugtiI Abdul Rauf Mengal

Position Member Senate of Pakistan (2002-2009) Member Senate of Pakistan (2006-2012) Member National Assembly (2002-2007)

Disrtric Kharran Dera Bugti Khuzdar

Province Balochistan Balochistan Balochistan

Country Pakistan Pakistan Pakistan

1. 2. 3.

Former Members of Parliament and Leaders of Secular Democratic Parties of Balochistan on Exit Control List
S.N o

Name Sardar Attahullah Mengal Nawab Akbar Khan Bugti Mohammad Akhtar Mengal

Position Former Chief Minister and Member Parliament of Pakistan Former Chief Minister and Member Parliament of Pakistan Former Chief Minister and Member Provincial Assembly and Leader of Oppossition Former Member of Parliament Position Member Balochistan Provincial Assembly

Disrtric Kharran

Province Balochistan

Country Pakistan

1.

2.

Dera Bugti Khuzdar

Balochistan

Pakistan

3.

Balochistan

Pakistan

4.

Nawab Khair Bux Khan Marri Name Mir Balach Khan Marri

Kolu

Balochistan

Pakistan

Members of Balochistan Provincial Assembly on Exit Control List


S.N o

Disrtric Kolu

Province Balochistan

Country Pakistan

Family Members of Former Members of Parliament on Exit Control List


S.N o

Name Sardar Attahullah Mengal Nawab Akbar Khan Bugti Mohammad Akhtar Mengal

Position Former Chief Minister and Member Parliament of Pakistan Former Chief Minister and Member Parliament of Pakistan Former Chief Minister and Member Provincial Assembly and Leader of Oppossition Former Member of Parliament

Disrtric Khuzdar

Province Balochistan

Country Pakistan

1.

2.

Dera Bugti Khuzdar

Balochistan

Pakistan

3.

Balochistan

Pakistan

4.

Nawab Khair Bux Khan Marri

Kolu

Balochistan

Pakistan

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Thursday, April 06, 2006

High drama grips DHA as Mengals house besieged


* Police cordon off his residence off Khayaban-eShamsheer By Abbas Naqvi KARACHI: The residence of the chief of his own faction of the Balochistan National Party (BNP), Akhtar Mengal, was cordoned off by law enforcement agencies from about 9:30 a.m. on Wednesday morning leading to tension along Cliftons Khayaban-e-Shamsheer and surrounding areas near the Sea View strip all day long. Former Balochistan chief minister Ataullah Mengal told Daily Times that his son Akhtar Mengal accompanied his children to school in the morning as they had been receiving kidnapping threats recently. Akhtar Mengal and his guards noticed four men in plainclothes on two motorcycles following their car and intercepted them. Mengals guards managed to catch hold of three of the men but one of them escaped. Ataullah Mengal said that when the three men were taken back to the Mengal residence and asked who they were and what they were doing, they said that they were from the Military Intelligence (MI). During this time, a large contingent of rangers, police and other law enforcement personnel arrived near the house and cordoned it off, Ataullah Mengal said. According to Ataullah Mengal, the three men were handed over to the police outside. In the meantime, Mengal said that the entire area was cordoned off and no one was allowed to enter or leave the house. The police surrounded the immediate area around the house while rangers personnel spread out in the vicinity. Clifton Town police was called to the spot in addition to members from the police headquarters. The area was cordoned off till the filing of this report. There were reports that Akhtar Mengals brother Javeds house in DHA Phase VI was also surrounded. Police sources said that the three intelligence officers who were handed over from the Mengal house were taken to JPMC for a medical examination as they had been beaten. Police sources said that legal requirements for the registration of an FIR had been completed and one is expected to be lodged late Wednesday night. All this that is happening in reaction to a rally that Akhtar lead in Quetta against the army operation in the province, his father said. The way they killed Gichki in jail, Im afraid theyll kill Akhtar too.

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http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2006%5C04%5C08%5Cstory_8-42006_pg12_11
Saturday, April 08, 2006

Ataullahs, Akhtars houses surrounded


Staff Report KARACHI: The unfolding of the Mengal-government drama continued on Friday when Law Enforcement Agencies (LEA) surrounded the houses of Akhtar Mengal and his father Ataullah Mengal. The incoming LEAs also stopped MNA Abdul Rauf Mengal and MPAs Akbar Mengal and Mir Akhtar Lango from leaving Akhtars house. They were inside when the agencies arrived. A senior Sindh minister telephoned my son asking him to meet an M I brigadier, Ataullah said while talking to Daily Times. He is a former chief minister of Balochistan and also the president of the Pakistan Oppressed Nations Movement (PONM). My son told him that the brigadier should meet him at his house if he really wanted to talk. Why should Akhtar go to him? retorted the elderly Mengal. Ataullah said his workers were not afraid of jails and arrests. He said he had seen jails in the past. Ataullah alleged that the government started victimizing his family after Akhtar held an anti-government rally in Quetta last week. The LEAs left Akhtars house after noontime. Akhtar came out at 3:00 p.m. and met police officials who were still there. I asked them whether they had any warrant to arrest me. They said they did not, Akhtar said. He lives in DHA on Khayaban-e- Saher, 28 Street. Akhtar also claimed that another one of his servants had been arrested on Friday. My servant, Ghulam Qadir was also arrested when he went to the police station with food for my arrested guards (Mehboob Ali and Nasrullah) and driver (Ghulam Haider), he said. Falling short of calling it a threat, Akhtar said many Baloch activists had been picked up by agencies in similar fashion. He claimed that more than 8,000 Baloch people were in the custody of government agencies, out of which 600 had been killed, all during the recent military action in Balochistan and Sindh. Akhtar said the country was being ruled by secret service agencies. He said these agencies were committing human rights violations, and also depriving the smaller provinces of their legitimate rights. Akhtar urged the United Nations and other international bodies, including the Human Rights Commission to take note of the atrocities in Balochistan. On Friday also, Sindh opposition leader Nisar Ahmed Khuhro visited Akhtar Mengal at his residence. Khuhro assured Mengal that he would raise this issue in the Sindh Assembly session.

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Saturday, April 08, 2006

Mengals employees remanded


KARACHI: The administrative judge of an antiterrorism court in Karachi has remanded two guards and a driver of former Balochistan Chief Minister Sardar Akhtar Mengal into police custody till April 14, 2006 in the army personnel hostagetaking case. Nasrullah Mengal 23 (driver), Ghulam Hyder Langah alias Chappar, 34, and Mehboob Ali Satti, 40, guards of Akhtar Mengal were produced amid tight security before A J Justice Amir Hani Muslim of the Sindh High Court for obtaining their remand. Akhtar Mengal, who is also leader of Balochistan National Party-Mengal, and two unidentified persons were declared absconding co-accused in the remand paper, which was submitted by the police before the A J. Investigation officer submitted that complainant Qurban Hussain, a havaldar of army, lodged an FIR at Darakshan police station on April 5, 2006 that he along with Lance Naik Fayaz Ahmed were going to Seaview on intelligence duty when they were intercepted by Sardar Akhtar Mengal along with four or five persons and kidnapped with the intention to kill. Hussain said they were made hostage at Akhtar Mengals house in Khayaban-e-Shamsher DHA Karachi for two hours, where they were subjected to torture. The complainant said that Akhtar Mengal directed his men to kill them and send their bodies to army. The abducted managed to escape after police and law enforcement agencies besieged the house. The FIR was lodged against accused under section 364, 353, 342, 186, 395, 397, 337 of PPC with section 6 (m) (n) and 7 of Anti Terrorism Act. IO of the case sought remand of accused till April 20 to interrogate them. The defence counsel of the accused Syed Ghulam Mustafa Shah raised objection on remanding of accused under anti terrorism law contending the case does not fall under schedule offence of Anti Terrorism Act and prayed A J to dismiss remand request of police. The A J remanded the accused to police custody till April 14 and directed medical treatment be provided to accused if required. On complaint of accused that they were not given food, A J directed that they should be provided fundamental facility as per law. PPI

http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2006%5C04%5C08%5Cstory_8-42006_pg12_12 ******************************

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http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2006%5C04%5C10%5Cstory_10-42006_pg12_3
Monday, April 10, 2006

Mengal likely to file petition today


Staff Report KARACHI: Sardar Akhter Mengal, former chief minister of Balochistan and chief of the Balochistan National Party, is likely to file a petition before the Sindh High Court (SHC) on Monday (today) against the decision to surround his residence in Defence, phase-V for the last five days. We have decided to approach the SHC to challenge the illegal action of the law enforcement agencies, MNA Rauf Mengal told journalists outside Mengal residence on Sunday evening where BNP activists held demonstrations. Rauf Mengal, who was allowed by the LEAs to come out of the house, told reporters that they had formed a panel comprising five lawyers to prepare the petition. He said that the petition would be filed on Monday (today). Mengal said that the governments tall claims of democracy and upholding the supremacy of parliament had been exposed by the action taken against Baloch political leaders and cases against elected representatives. He said that they were ready to face legal action if there was any case against them. Referring to his contacts with the Sindh chief minister and the governor, Mengal regretted that the top provincial authorities had adopted an apologetic attitude towards the incident. He claimed that Balochistan was in protest against the siege of the Mengal houses in Karachi. Rauf Mengal said that PONM had taken initiative. Similarly, the ARD had raised its voice against the siege. Earlier, some dozens Baloch activists blocked one lane of Khayaban-eShamsheer, however, they ended the protest when the LEAs allowed a tanker to carry water to the Mengal residence. Later, the police ordered them to leave the main road. Akhter Mengal told journalists over the mobile phone from the balcony of his residence that the water supply to his house had been cut off. The officials had allowed them to bring food though, he added. He categorically stated that no dialogue had been held with government officials. Around 10 police mobile units were seen cordoning off the residence on Sunday.

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http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2006%5c04%5c16%5cstory_16-42006_pg7_24
Sunday, April 16, 2006

Mengal appeals to SC for protection


Staff Report KARACHI: The president of the Balochistan National Party (BNP), Sardar Akhter Mengal, has appealed to the Supreme Court to take suo motu action against the secret agency personnel who have been (reportedly) trying to kill or abduct him and his party workers for the past 12 days. Addressing a press conference at the Karachi Press Club on Saturday, the Baloch sardar alleged that after they filed a petition in the Sindh High Court, the siege of his house was ended by the law enforcement agencies but they have still been chasing him and his partys workers. Mengal feared his and its workers lives were in danger from secret agencies, including the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) and Military Intelligence (MI). Province-wide wheel jam and shutter down strikes today (Saturday) were observed by Baloch and Pushtoon nationalists in Balochistan against military action in Balochistan and the siege of my house in Karachi, said Mengal, adding that the government had started victimizing his family after the BNP arranged a successful rally in Quetta last week. About the federal ban on the Baloch Liberation Army, Mengal said it was not a registered organization and no notification could harm it. In the past, the previous government had banned the defunct National Awami Party, said Mengal

Benazir seeks withdrawal of cases against Akhtar Mengal By Our Reporter ISLAMABAD, June 14: Former prime minister and Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) Chairperson Benazir Bhutto on Wednesday condemned the victimisation of former Balochistan chief minister Akhtar Mengal and warned that chasing and hounding of Baloch leaders for political dissent could have serious repercussions for the federation. In a statement, the PPP chairperson criticized the policy of seeking to eliminate political leaders through abuse of judicial system. She said such narrow-minded tactics had also failed in the past leading to the disintegration of the country. An anti-terrorist court in Karachi declared the other day Akhtar Mengal a proclaimed offender and also ordered attachment of his entire movable and immovable property. Sardar Akhtar Mengal, who is also chief of Balochistan National Party (BNP), was earlier declared absconder in a case registered by the security agencies. Ms Bhutto said that it was shocking to note how the regime was dealing with the political issues in Balochistan. Political issues can be resolved only through political means and use of force is counterproductive, she said. She expressed the fear that turmoil in Baluchistan might spill over into Sindh.

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Declaring Akhtar Mengal a proclaimed offender and placing legislators of the Baloch nationalist parties on the Exit Control List is a violation of the fundamental rights of freedom to travel, she said. It also mocks the Parliamentary Committee on Balochistan that recommended several political measures for defusing the Baloch tension, she added. The continued victimisation of Balochistan National Party, a secular and moderate force, is aimed at strengthening theocratic elements, she said.

Authorities block access to Baloch nationalist websites

Franais: Les autorits interdisent l'accs aux sites nationalistes baloutches Country/Topic: Pakistan Date: 28 April 2006 Source: Reporters Without Borders (RSF) Person(s): Target(s): Internet/website(s) Type(s) of violation(s): closed Urgency: Flash (RSF/IFEX) - Reporters Without Borders has condemned a decision by the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) on 25 April 2006 to block four Baloch nationalist websites for carrying "misleading information." The move comes two months after the PTA blocked access to 12 websites displaying the controversial Mohammed cartoons. "Only a judge should be able to order the filtering of an online publication," the press freedom organisation said. "The PTA should not have this power, as it is an administrative entity directly linked to the government." The PTA's closure order cites four Baluch sites and a Hindu site, http://www.hinduunity.com, that is very hostile towards Muslims. The four Baluch sites are http://www.balochvoice.com (which carries news about the fighting in Baluchistan as well as international media reports), http://www.baloch2000.org and http://www.balochfront.com (which support the Baluch nationalists), and http://www.sanabaloch.com (a Baluch politician's site). While the PTA decree accuses the sites of containing misleading information, a PTA official referred to the sites as having "ties" with Baluch nationalist leaders and said the decision to ban them was reached jointly with the government. The PTA blocked 12 sites including http://www.blogger.com on 28 February for carrying the Mohammed cartoons that were first published in Denmark. This decision was never endorsed by a court. For more information on the case: http://www.rsf.org/article.php3?id_article=16678

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Meanwhile, there is still no word of Munir Mengal, the head of Baluchi-language TV station Baloch Voice, who disappeared on arriving in Karachi on 7 April. His family thinks military intelligence officers kidnapped him at the airport. For more information on this case: http://www.rsf.org/article.php3?id_article=17053 A southwestern province with 5.6 million ethnic Baluchis, Baluchistan has seen sporadic fighting for several years between the Pakistani army and armed nationalists who want independence. It is very hard for journalists to work there. MORE INFORMATION:

For further information, contact Julien Pain, RSF Internet Desk, 5, rue Geoffroy Marie, Paris 75009, France, tel: +33 1 44 83 84 71, fax: +33 1 45 23 11 51, e-mail: internet@rsf.org, Internet: http://www.internet.rsf.org **For further information on the Munir Mengal case, see IFEX alert of 13 April 2006; for information on the blocking of websites publishing the Danish cartoons, see alert of 7 March 2006**

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BALOCHISTAN VICTIM OF LANDMINES


USE OF LANDMINES BY MILITARY AND PARAMILITARY AGAINST INNOCENT CIVILIANS IN BALOCHISTAN

Pakistan Landmine Reports and Casualties. Landmine incidents in Balochistan More details

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Pakistan;
Landmine Casualties 2004.
In 2003, there were at least 138 new landmine/UXO casualties in Pakistan, including 48 people killed and 90 injured; 85 were civilians, including 14 children and 11 women.[45] SPADO recorded casualties in four provinces, the tribal areas, and Azad Kashmir: 23 casualties in Punjab province; 55 in Baluchistan; five in Sindh province; 46 in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas; and nine in Kashmir. Casualties in 2003 include an Afghan refugee who lost both her legs above the knee after stepping on a landmine in Bajaur Agency.[46] Reported casualties have increased over the past few years. However, this increase may be due in part to improved data collection mechanisms in the mine-affected areas. Between 2000 and 2002, Landmine Monitor reported at least 290 new landmine/UXO casualties: at least 136 (83 killed and at least 53 injured) in 2002; 92 (28 killed and 64 injured) in 2001; and 62 casualties in 2000.[47] In April 2004, the National Assembly was informed that 150 mine casualties had occurred in the border areas of Lahore, Bahawalpur, Gujranjwala, Sindh and Kasur during the military standoff with India, including 23 people killed and 99 who lost limbs. The time period of the incidents was not specified.[48] Casualties continue to be reported in 2004. Between January and June, 32 new landmine casualties (five people killed and 27 injured) were reported in the media, including a woman who was killed after stepping on a landmine while harvesting her wheat crop.[49] In two other incidents in Kurram Agency in June, a farmer stepped on a landmine and lost his right leg below the knee, and three children, aged five, seven and nine, were injured after tampering with a landmine.[50] There is no comprehensive reporting system in the country and therefore a large number of casualties are likely to remain unreported. The Pakistan Campaign to Ban Landmines started collecting data on landmine/UXO casualties in September 1997 from various sources, including newspapers, Tribal Agency Headquarter Hospitals, the Social Welfare & Rehabilitation Center for the Disabled, the Community Motivation and Development Organization database on the Bajaur tribal area, and team visits to mine-affected areas. PCBL identified 1,038 landmine/UXO casualties (377 killed, 566 injured and 95 unknown) between 1980 and 2002; 71 percent are male and 29 percent female.[51]

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In September 2003, seven Pakistani nationals were reportedly killed after stepping on landmines while trying to enter Greece illegally.[52] Five Pakistani nationals were killed in Iran, near the border with Pakistan, in December 2002 after their vehicle hit a landmine.[53]

Landmine/UXO Casualties 2005.


In 2004, according to Sustainable Peace and Development Organization, there were at least 195 new casualties, including 67 people killed and 128 injured, caused by landmines, UXO or IEDs; 59 were civilians, including 11 children and five women.[65] This represents a significant increase from the 138 new casualties (48 killed and 90 injured) reported in 2003.[66] Of the total casualties, 76 were caused by antivehicle mines, 69 by IEDs, 29 by antipersonnel mines and 21 by UXO. The majority of casualties were recorded in the Federally Administrated Tribal Areas: 130 in South Waziristan; nine in Kurram; eight in North Waziristan; four in Mohmand; three in Dara Adam Khel; one in Bajaur. In the remaining four provinces: 25 casualties were recorded in Baluchistan; nine in the Northwest Frontier Province; four in Punjab; two in Sindh. There was a sharp increase in casualties in the last four months of 2004, with 128 casualties reported between September and November, due to rising tensions in southern FATA. Most incidents occurred while people were traveling; 22 casualties were caused by tampering. Casualties continue to be reported in 2005. Community Appraisal and Motivation Program recorded 11 people killed and 57 others injured to 29 May 2005; 66 were civilians, including four children. The majority of casualties were caused by IEDs.[67 ] On 31 May, two children and three women were killed and six other people were injured when their vehicle hit a landmine in the southeastern province of Baluchistan.[68 ]In July, three tribesmen were injured when a landmine exploded on a volleyball ground in South Waziristan.[69 ] Community Motivation and Development Organization also collects casualty data in the tribal areas. In 2004 and early 2005, 103 new mine/UXO casualties were recorded, including 24 people killed and 79 injured.[70 ] One UNMIL Pakistani EOD officer was slightly injured in 2004 when disposing of a hand grenade in Liberia.[71] There is no comprehensive reporting or data collection system in Pakistan and a large number of mine casualties are likely to be unreported. Several national NGOs record casualties based on media reports, or information coming from their teams in the field and from other NGOs. Therefore, the total number of landmine casualties is not known. According to CMDO and the Pakistan Campaign to Ban Landmines, it is estimated that there are 5,000 landmine casualties in the tribal areas.[72] CMDOs household survey collected information on 736 landmine casualties, including 292 people killed and 444 injured (346 amputees) to March 2003 in Bajaur Agency.[73 ] In a household survey by Response International UK (RI) and CMDO in Kurram Agency, 7,189 households have been surveyed: 707 reported mine casualties in their household,

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including 293 people killed and injured; 243 required an amputation and 171 suffered other injuries; 123 were under 18 years of age; 82 were female.[74]

Production, Transfer and Stockpiling Stockpiling


According toLand Mine Report 2004; There is no official information on the size of Pakistans stockpile. Since 2000, Landmine Monitor has estimated that Pakistan holds at least six million antipersonnel mines in stockpile, based on discussions with a senior Pakistani official.[18] This constitutes the fifth largest stockpile in the world. The government has neither confirmed nor denied the number. It is not known how the size of the stockpile has changed with new production of antipersonnel mines and with Pakistans extensive use of antipersonnel mines in 2001 and 2002. Pakistan is modifying its existing stock of low-metal-content antipersonnel mines to make them conform to the detectability requirement of Amended Protocol II.[19] Pakistan is a producer of antipersonnel mines. State-owned Pakistan Ordnance Factories (POF), founded in 1951, in the past produced six types of antipersonnel mines.[4] Pakistan has stated that after January 1997 it started production of new detectable versions of the P2MK2 and P4MK2 handemplaced mines, and that it is producing new remotely-delivered antipersonnel mines with self-destruct and self-deactivating mechanisms.[5] In its 2002 Article 13 report, Pakistan reiterates that all technical requirements of Amended Protocol II have been appropriately included at the development, production and user levels.[6]

Mine Ban Policy


Pakistan has not acceded to the 1997 Mine Ban Treaty. In October 2002, Pakistan said that its position on the question of anti-personnel landmines is determined by legitimate security concerns. Given our security compulsions and the need to guard our long borders not protected by any natural obstacle, the use of landmines forms a natural part of our self-defence strategy. As such, it is not possible for Pakistan to agree to the demands for the complete prohibition of anti-personnel landmines till such time that viable alternatives are available.... We remain committed to ensuring the highest standards of responsibility in the use of these defensive weapons.[1] As in previous years, Pakistan abstained from voting on the November 2002 pro-Mine Ban Treaty UN General Assembly Resolution. Pakistan did not attend the Fourth Meeting of States Parties in September 2002 and did not participate in the intersessional Standing Committee meetings in February and May 2003.

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Pakistan participated in the Fourth Annual Conference on Amended Protocol II to the Convention on Conventional Weapons in December 2002 and submitted its annual report required by Article 13 of Amended Protocol II. At the Conference Pakistan stated, Amended Protocol II seeks to strike the right balance between the legitimate security requirements of the States Parties and humanitarian concerns.[2] Pakistan called for expanded and strengthened mine clearance and victim assistance programs, as well as research into viable landmine alternatives with a view to advancing the goal of an eventual universal ban on landmines. Pakistan also expressed appreciation for the positive role played by the ICRC, the ICBL and other Non-Governmental Organizations in responding to mine related emergencies.[3] USE; Pakistan military and paramilitary is using landmines in eastren districts of Balochistan to protect the oil and gas Installations. They are laying Landmines around the area of natural resources to keep the local population away from the companies.

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Major Incident of landmine occurred in March 2006.

http://www.dawn.com/2006/03/11/top3.htm

28 on way to wedding killed: Landmine blast in Dera Bugti


By Saleem Shahid and Amanullah Kasi

QUETTA, March 10: At least 28 people, most of them women and children, were killed and 7 others injured on Friday morning when a tractor trailer carrying a wedding party hit an anti-tank mine near Bakar area in Dera Bugti district. A spokesman for the provincial government, Raziq Bugti, told Dawn that the landmine victims included six men and 20 women and children who were travelling to Rakhni from Bakar area for a wedding. Most of the victims were close relatives of each other, he said. Twenty-six passengers were killed on the spot, according to Mr Bugti. Two other persons died later while they were being taken to hospital.

The condition of at least three more persons is stated to be critical. The tractor trailer was completely destroyed in the explosion. The sound of the explosion was heard up to several kilometres away from the blast site, sources said.

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Balochistan Chief Minister Jam Mir Mohammad Yousuf condemned the landmine blast as a barbarian and inhuman act and said it was against the ethics, tribal values and traditions of the province. The chief minister held anti-development elements responsible for the blast. The trailer was part of a convoy of vehicles. However, the people travelling in other vehicles remained unhurt. Frontier Corps personnel rushed to the site and started retrieving bodies from the blast site. They also flew the injured by helicopter to medical facilities in Dera Ghazi Khan. The victims had nothing to do with politics, power struggle and mega projects. They were simple, decent and common folk who were going to attend a wedding in Rakhni, he said. He promised that the people who planted the landmine would not go unpunished and would be arrested soon. The government will not bow down before these elements and will continue its action against them, he said and added that all other political parties should also condemn the incident. Jam Yousuf said the government would take all possible steps to prevent landmines from being planted in these areas and avoid such incidents in the future. He said the latest equipment would be provided to all districts of Balochistan to clear the anti-personnel mines planted by saboteurs in troubled areas. In reply to a question, he said the government would soon announce compensation for the victims of the blast. Responding to yet another question, he said that the government had been making all out efforts to control the situation.

http://www.dawn.com/2006/05/04/top16.htm

BNP briefs EU lawmakers on Balochistan situation


By Shadaba Islam

BRUSSELS, May 3: Balochistan National Party secretary-general Sanaullah Baloch on Wednesday briefed European Union lawmakers on Pakistan army operations in his province, saying Islamabad must be told to immediately stop the violation of human rights of the Baloch people.

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Mr Baloch told Dawn he had also informed several members of the European Parliament of the alleged use of landmines by the Pakistan military and paramilitary forces. Mehran Baloch, who heads the BNP mission to the human rights commission in Geneva, said EU lawmakers had also been briefed on the Pakistan armys misuse and abuse of foreign military hardware to oppress the Baloch people. Equipment supplied by western nations, including the US, to track down Taliban and Al Qaeda insurgents was being used against the Baloch people, he charged. We have the proof of such misuse, he said.

BRUSSELS: Senator Sanaullah Baloch and Meharan Baloch with EU Parliament Vice President May 3, 2006

http://www.dawn.com/2006/04/03/top2.htm

Landmines kill 10 in Balochistan


By Saleem Shahid

QUETTA, April 2: Five levies personnel and five civilians were killed and 29 people were injured in four incidents of landmine explosions in Sani Shoran of Bolan district, Kohlu and Jaffarabad on Sunday. In the first incident, official sources said that a convoy of the Pakistan Petroleum Limited (PPL) was moving to an exploration site in Sani Shoran. It was a escorted by levies personnel who were in a pick-up which hit a landmine. The resulting explosion killed six people, five of them levies personnel, on the spot and seriously injured two levies personnel. Soon after the explosion, armed men opened fire on the convoy from the nearby mountains. The sources said that security forces rushed to the place and returned fire. The heavy exchange of fire continued for more than an hour. The bodies of the five levies men and a PPL employee were reduced to pieces as the

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pick-up was completely destroyed, a senior official of the Bolan district administration said, adding that an anti-tank mine had been planted on the track to the PPL exploration site. The bodies of landmine victims and the injured were taken to the Civil Hospital in Sibi. Later, one of the injured levies personnel was taken to Quetta in a helicopter. The levies personnel killed in the incident have been identified as Abdul Haleem Gishkori, Raja Khan Rind, Imam Bakhsh Bungulzai, Ali Nawaz and Mohammad Nawaz. The PPL employee was identified as Mohammad Munir. A caller identifying himself as Mirak Baloch told newsmen over the phone that the Baloch Liberation Army had planted the landmine in Bolan district. In the second incident, two landmines exploded within a short span of time near the Government Dairy Farm in Kohlu, killing three people and injuring 25 others, seven of them children. Official sources said that the landmine had exploded in Killi Wazirhan Loharni, seriously injuring three children who were playing outside their home. Another landmine exploding in the same area killed three people on the spot and injured 22 others. These were anti-personnel mines planted by miscreants which exploded within a short span of time, a senior official of the district administration, Kohlu, told Dawn over the telephone, adding that all the injured people were taken to the Civil Hospital Kohlu. Nine of the injured were discharge after first aid while nine others were sent to Dera Ghazi Khan. A woman and a six-year-old girl were among the victims of the explosions, the sources said, adding that the building of the government dairy farm was also damaged. The three victims have been identified as Baz Mohammad Marri, Mst Naz Bakht and Sher Khatoon. In the third incident, a man identified as Amir Mohammad Bugti was killed in the Pahawr Sinery area of Jaffarabad district when his tractor was hit by a landmine. Official sources confirmed the incident and said that two other people who were also on the tractor were injured.

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Baloch Policy on LANDMINE USE;


All Baloch political and Patriots are against use of Landmine by the Military and Para-military in Balochistan and there is general concesus on the issue, that military and para-military non Baloch forces are laying landmines in different part of Balochistan to continue their Exploitation and discourage people of traveling and coming closer to the exploitation sites. A Baloch nationalist website is creating awareness and all Baloch political activists are against the use of landmine by the Military and Para-military in Balochistan and International community should take a firm stand on this humanitarian crisis.

Baloch unity strongly condemns land mine war in civilian zones,

Baloch unity has been watching the events taking place in Balochistan with great anxiety most particularly after the Govt started the 5th army operation in Balochistan as in all war zone the biggest thrust of war lays on poor and help less civilian population as both warring parties try to eliminate each other in that elimination process the civilian population becomes the prime victims of war. We ask the world community to ban land mines and those plants them should be scrutinized through international criminal courts, all civilian zones should be free of land mines this should be rule for all parties. According to our estimations more then 80 people in Balochistan has been killed by these sleeping monsters in different areas of Balochistan during last 4 years. We request the international community and Baloch leadership to denounce this land mine war which is killing poor Baloch people where there are absolutely no carpeted roads and all such roads are potential threat for local people way of life and movements beside human deaths so far many animals were lost in these land mines war. These land mine wars can trigger tribal revenge wars which can be more deadly then the main battle taking place between Govt and BLA.

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Killing helpless civilians in such large numbers is a crime against humanity and should be condemned by all side and all religions; this was a cowardly act and has no other explanations then that we condemn such inhuman and brutal war against women and children. If our recommendations are not taken seriously then soon or later we will face all out civil war in Balochistan where every body will be killing each other or spending money to buy more land mines to kill their opponents in this land mine war which has no face and signs until it blows away people in peaces. A press release from Baloch unity March 10th 2006

Baloch unity recently had a poll on use of landmine and Majority of Baloch visitors were against the USE of landmine by Government. http://balochunity.org/
Questioners
Are you against the use of land mines in Balochistan? Answers Yes No Cannot say 18 % 1% Persents 80 % Voices 1945 438 42

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TALIBANIZATION OF

BALOCHISTAN
By Intelligence Agencies and Federal Government

Intentionally Military Rulers of Pakistan are supporting Pro-Taliban Religious Parties and Theocrats in Balochistan to sideline the secular Baloch political forces and continue meddling in Afghanistan via remote region of Balochistan. Balochistan Over-drafted 14 Billion Rupees From the State Bank of Pakistan and most of the Money has been spent and used by Pro-Taliban Ministers. Out of TWENTY SEVEN provincial ministers of Balochistan cabinet 16 ministers belong to MMA, Pro-Taliban of Northern Balochistan.

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International Comments on Talibanization of Balochistan Pakistan Military Rulers and Intelligence Agencies

Pakistan sheltering Taliban, says British officer Declan Walsh in Kandahar, Friday May 19, 2006

Baluchistan feeds Taliban's growing power


Declan Walsh, Chronicle Foreign Service Wednesday, May 31, 2006

Where the Taliban prepare for jihad


From Abdullah Shahin in Quetta

Suspicions of Taliban in Pakistan June 10, 2006

PAKISTAN: MP CALLS ON FAITHFUL TO JOIN TALIBAN IN AFGHANISTAN AKI) - Quetta, 30 May 2006 (by
Syed Saleem Shahzad

Taliban leaders alive and well in Pakistan

Undefeated
On the Afghanistan-Pakistan border, the Taliban are regrouping, bent on spreading terror BY PHIL ZABRISKIE / SPIN BOLDAK

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Story of Withdrawal of Cases and Military Support to Pro-Taliban MMA in Balochistan

Did Military govt strike deal with MMA?


By Shamim-ur-Rahman December 30, 2002. http://www.dawn.com/2002/12/30/top4.htm KARACHI, Dec 29: While the list of the much talked about cases against Dr Ishratul Ibad, the new governor of Sindh, is not being brought to light by his critics, one thing has emerged that something had cooked up before the general elections owing to which the home departments in various provinces had taken initiative to withdraw cases against political activists. In Sindh, political activists of the Muttahida Qaumi Movement, who were booked in heinous crimes, were released through courts. There is official record suggesting that in August directives were issued to public prosecutors by the Balochistan home department for taking necessary action for withdrawal of cases registered against the leaders and activists of religious parties. Those leaders and activists were involved in anti-regime political activities. However, after elections it was witnessed that some of those who were convicted and sent to prison, were released as a quid pro quo for the MMAs understanding with the PML-Q for the formation of a government in Balochistan. The instructions communicated by Eugene. L.M. Wang, section officer (solicitor) in the law department of Balochistan, dated Aug 26, 2002, indicate that the regime had, in fact, entered into some deal with the political elements of all shades religious, ethnic, etc. much before the elections were held. Neither side is prepared to sate whether or not it was part of some understanding. But in Sindh the concerned departments have suddenly expressed ignorance of criminal or other cases, if any, against the new governor. According to a list of 20 such cases obtained by Dawn, prosecutors were directed to move an application in respective courts for the withdrawal of cases. The cases pertained to anti-government rallies and use of loudspeakers, etc., by the MMA leaders. They include Maulana Abdul Ghafoor Hyderi against whom three FIRs (239, 244 and 309 of 2001) were lodged with the Saddar police station in Quetta for taking out an anti-government procession and speaking at an anti-government press conference. The list includes FIR 275/2001 in which Sardar Mohammad Ashraf Kakar, Hafiz Hussain Ahmad, Zahid Akhtar Baloch, Dr Khalid Nawaz and Maulana Abdul

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Ghafoor Hyderi were nominated. Maulana Hyderi was also nominated in FIR 164 of 2001. Maulana Fazlur Rehman, Maulana Mohammad Khan Shirani, Maulana Abdul Ghafoor Hyderi, Hafiz Hussain Ahmad, Abdul Qadir Looni, Maulana Allahdad and Aziz Khilji advocate were implicated in the anti-government procession taken out on Oct 2, 2001 in FIR 186 under section 188 of the PPC. Mir Gohar Khan Zarakzai, Hafiz Hussain Ahmad and Maulana Noor Mohammad were identified in FIR 310 lodged under sections 124, 124-A, and 505 of the PPC and 16 of the MPO. In FIR 224, Abdul Qadir Looni, Mohammad Idrees Lango, Anwarul Haq Haqqani, Maulana Noor Mohammad and Abdul Ghani were nominated. Hafiz Hussain Ahmad was mentioned in FIR 2238/2001 for taking out an antigovernment procession whereas in FIR 213 Hafiz Hussain Ahmad Sheerodi was required for the violation of Loudspeaker Act 1965. He was also required in FIRs 216 of 2001 and 38 of 2002 for violating the same Act. The list also includes FIR 8/2002, implicating Jamiat Ulema-i-Islam and Sipah-iSahaba under sections 123, 124, 153, 500, 506 and 34 of the PPC and 16 of the MPO for taking out an anti-government procession in Khuzdar. The case FIR 34/2002 pertains to implication of Abdul Latif, Maulana Mohammad Essa Nasrullah and others on a similar charge. The case FIR 36/2002 is against some BNP and JUI activists for blocking the Quetta-Karachi Highway. Haji Mita Khan Jatak was required in FIR 122/2001, lodged with the Dera Murad Jamali police station under sections 188, 186, 337-A, 337-H QD, 353, 147, 148, 149, 427, 431 and 441 of the PPC for criminal trespass, rioting and obstructing in government duties. The case against Maulana Abdul Haq was registered in Sibi under FIR 14/2002 for taking out an anti-government procession on Dec 7, 2001. Maulana Abdullah, Maulana Taj Mohammad, Maulana Khuda Bux, Maulana Hafiz Mohammad Hussain, Maulana Mohammad Khashim, Maulana Abdul Hafiz, Maulana Abdul Aziz, Maulana Abdul Khair and others were implicated in FIR 20/2001 lodged for blocking the National Highway in Sibi and taking out an anti-government procession. Under FIR 13/2002, Maulana Amir Zaman, Maulana Faizullah and Syed Bacha Agha were charged with violation of the Loudspeaker Act in Loralai, whereas under FIR 194/2001, Maulana Noor Mohammad, Maulana Allahdad Khairkhwa, Maulana Hafiz Hussain Ahmed and 36 others were implicated in rioting by the JUI activists in Quetta on Oct 8, 2001.

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Tuesday, February 15, 2005 Balochistan MMA supports Musharrafs Pro-Taliban and Chinese Exploitation development plans ISLAMABAD: The Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal in Balochistan on Monday voiced support for President General Pervez Musharrafs plans for the development of the province. Maulvi Abdul Wasay, senior minister in the Balochistan government, and MPA Maulana Muhammad Khan Sherani called on President Musharraf in Rawalpindi on Monday afternoon. The two MMA leaders assured Musharraf of the full support of the alliances wing in Balochistan for the provincial and federal governments development projects. The MMA leaders also praised the rescue and relief operations of the Pakistani armed forces after heavy rains and floods devastated parts of southern Balochistan. Gen Musharraf thanked the MMA leaders for their support and said the federal government was committed to assisting the development of Balochistan. He assured them he would protect the interests of the people of Balochistan on all matters. He said the government would ensure the protection of all national installations in the province. staff report

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Pakistan sheltering Taliban, says British officer


Colonel's outburst follows multiple terror attacks Afghanistan president says Quetta used as base Declan Walsh in Kandahar Friday May 19, 2006 The Guardian

Afghan National Army (ANA) troops on patrol in Laskhar Gah, the capital of Helmand province in southern Afghanistan. Photo: Declan Walsh A senior British officer accused Pakistan of allowing the Taliban to use its territory as a "headquarters" for attacks on western troops in Afghanistan as insurgents struck on multiple fronts yesterday. In one of the worst 24-hour periods since they were ousted from power in 2001, the Taliban launched two suicide bombs, numerous firefights and a massive assault on a village in Helmand province, where 3,300 British soldiers are being deployed. The violence, which started on Wednesday night, caused 105 deaths including 87 Taliban, 15 police, an American civilian and a Canadian woman soldier, according to the highest estimates. British forces were not involved. Colonel Chris Vernon, chief of staff for southern Afghanistan, said the Taliban leadership was coordinating its campaign from the western Pakistani city of Quetta, near the Afghan border. "The thinking piece of the Taliban is out of Quetta in

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Pakistan. It's the major headquarters," he told the Guardian. "They use it to run a series of networks in Afghanistan." The Afghan president, Hamid Karzai, echoed these comments by accusing Pakistan of arming the insurgents. "Pakistani intelligence gives military training to people and then sends them to Afghanistan with logistics," the Pakistan-based Afghan Islamic Press news agency quoted him as saying. Col Vernon said the Quetta leadership controlled "about 25" mid-level commanders dotted across the Afghan south, one of whom was captured last month. He declined to name him. The unusually forthright British criticism, reflecting sentiments normally expressed in private by western commanders, drew a furious denial from the Pakistani military. "It is absolutely absurd that someone is talking like this. If the Taliban leadership was in Quetta we would be out of our minds not to arrest them," said a spokesman, Major General Shaukat Sultan. "They should give us actionable intelligence so that we can take action." The clash reflects growing tensions between Pakistan and the west as Nato prepares to assume command of southern Afghanistan from the US on July 31. About 7,000 troops from Britain, Canada and the Netherlands are deploying to Helmand, Kandahar and Uruzgan provinces, while another 1,000 Americans and Romanians will be stationed in Zabul. Kandahar has suffered the worst upheaval, much of it apparently aimed at unbalancing the Nato mission before it can settle down. Canadian troops have been pummelled with a string a suicide attacks, roadside bombs and an axe attack on an officer during a village meeting. On Wednesday a suicide bomber rammed into a UN vehicle near the main coalition base at Kandahar airport, killing himself and injuring the driver. Col Vernon said he had tightened security on the road after similar attacks in March by "imposing Northern Ireland procedures". On Wednesday night hundreds of Taliban fighters assailed Musa Qala village in northern Helmand, sparking an eight-hour battle that officials said left 40 militants and 13 police dead. Having convulsed the volatile south, the guerrilla summer offensive now threatens the rest of the country. Yesterday suicide bombers struck in the normally peaceful cities of Herat in the west and Ghazni to the north, killing an Afghan motorcyclist and a US police trainer. "This is the worst things have been since the fall of the Taliban," said a western source in Kandahar. Across the border, worried British and Canadian diplomats are pressing the Pakistani government to take a tougher approach to the Taliban. Although Pakistan forces have killed or arrested hundreds of al-Qaida suspects since 2001, it has detained only a

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handful of Taliban officials. The last big catch was spokesman Abdul Latif Hakimi, who was arrested in October 2005 after his mobile phone was traced to Quetta. "Clearly the Taliban are at large in Baluchistan, operating in Quetta. Obviously that's a cause for concern," said a British diplomat in Islamabad. "There's no evidence of a serious network of Taliban camps but it's easy for them to take cover in Afghan refugee camps." The 930-mile border, most of it barren mountains and desert, is notoriously porous. Maj Gen Sultan said that it was impossible for Pakistani officials to discriminate between ordinary Afghans and Taliban insurgents. Col Vernon did not say whether Mullah Omar, the Taliban's leader, was also sheltering in Quetta. Relations between Afghanistan and Pakistan worsened sharply in March after Afghan allegations that Omar, Osama bin Laden and more than 100 Taliban leaders were hiding in Pakistan. The Taliban fight has also become a propaganda war. The insurgents regularly paste "night letters" - threatening tracts against "collaborators" - on walls and doors in southern villages. A Taliban radio station has also started operating in Helmand, where the British troops are being deployed. Nato commanders are retaliating, pushing local media to publicise their successes. Domestic pressure means western journalists are also coming under scrutiny. http://www.guardian.co.uk/alqaida/story/0,,1778442,00.html

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Across the border from Britain's troops, Taliban rises again


This has been Afghanistan's bloodiest week for five years, and in the Pakistani city of Quetta, insurgents roam at will Declan Walsh & Bagarzai Saidan Saturday May 27, 2006 The Guardian

British soldiers transport unexploded ordnance in Afghanistan. Photograph: John D McHugh/Getty Azizullah, the serious-minded son of a Pakistani farmer, yearned for martyrdom, his family said. This week the Taliban made his wish come true. The zealots inspired him to jihad, trained him to shoot and dispatched him to fight the infidel Americans across the border in Afghanistan. So it was fitting that after he died last Sunday night, trapped under a hail of American firepower, that a procession of black-turbaned men brought him home. "He always wanted to die like this, a heroic death. We are very proud of him," said his brother, Gul Nasib, a solemn looking man with a drawn face, at their home in Bagarzai Saidan, a village on a yawning plain in Pakistan's Baluchistan province. The Afghan border lay 30 miles north. Now all that remained was a picture of Azizullah on the picture on Nasib's mobile phone, his eyes closed and flowers garlanded around his face. Hushed mourners

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streamed to the grave, a mound of stones draped with a green cloth. A waft of incense clung to the evening air. The Taliban flag fluttered at one end of the grave; the black and white standard of Jamiaat Ulema Islam (JUI-F), an extremist Pakistani religious party that helps to rule Baluchistan, protruded from the other. An hour earlier a radical cleric, Maulana Abdul Bari - who also happens to be Baluchistan's minister for public health - addressed the village from a mosque. "Azizullah was a true martyr, his place in paradise is guaranteed," he said, his words echoing through a loudspeaker and across the village. "His blood will not be lost. It will strengthen Islam like water feeds a tree." Azizullah died in Panjwayi, a violent district of Kandahar province where US A-10 "warthog" planes pounded a religious school filled with Taliban. The Americans claimed to have killed up to 80 fighters; yesterday a human rights group said 34 civilians perished too. The battle was the climax of Afghanistan's bloodiest week since 2001. A succession of firefights raged across Kandahar and Helmand, where 3,300 British troops are being deployed as part of an ambitious Nato mission. By yesterday an estimated 339 people were dead, most of them Taliban fighters like Azizullah. What worries western commanders and their Afghan allies is not just the intensity of the storm but its direction. The Taliban recruit, resupply and coordinate their war effort from Pakistan, according to western and military officials. The insurgents slip across at several points along the 930-mile border, a largely unpatrolled stretch of sand, rock and mountain. But the weakest - and most controversial - blindspot is in Baluchistan. A vast and largely lawless province, Baluchistan offers a range of hiding places. Returning from Azizullah's funeral service, the Guardian passed young men sauntering down the road or hunkered over tea at roadside cafes. All were dressed in inky black shalwar kameez and roughly tied black turbans - dress that is not native to Baluchistan but in Afghanistan is unambiguously associated with the Taliban. Some insurgents melt into the camps that house more than 231,000 Afghan refugees in Baluchistan. Others shelter in madrassas run by local sympathisers such as JUI-F and funded with Middle Eastern money. North of Pishin, a bustling market town, teenage boys with jewelled skullcaps sat cross-legged outside a mud-walled madrassa. The sign at the gate read "Zia ul Uloom Al Arabiya" - "the Light of the Knowledge of Arabia". Headquarters But the Taliban nerve centre is allegedly 30 miles south in the provincial capital Quetta, which a British officer, Colonel Chris Vernon, recently described as "the major headquarters".

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Once a British colonial garrison town, Quetta has long been a home to spies, smugglers and fighters. During the 1980s it was a base for Afghan mujahideen battling Soviet troops inside Afghanistan. Today it still has a pungent air of intrigue. Police at checkposts guard for Baluch nationalist guerrillas who have dramatically escalated a bombing campaign against the state. Government intelligence agents sit indiscreetly in the lobby of the largest hotel, the Serena, carefully tracking the movements of visiting foreigners. Diverted western aid, such as American vegetable oil and United Nations sheeting, are on sale in the main bazaar. For those interested, so are guns, heroin and hashish smuggled across the border from Afghanistan. The Taliban move through the town like a dark whisper. Yesterday morning in Pashtunibad district, small groups of young men with kohl under their eyes and silky white or black turbans on their heads strolled between the vegetable stalls and clothes traders. By midday many had pushed into the city's mosques, where preachers dished up the usual fiery fare. At the central mosque, Maulana Abdul Wahid railed against a Jewish and Christian "conspiracy against Muslims" and spoke admiringly about the suicide bombers. "Regardless of the cost to their lives, at least some Muslims are struggling," he told worshippers. The largely low-key Taliban presence occasionally bursts into the open. On May 8 motorcycle-riding assassins gunned down Mullah Samad Barakzai, a one-time Taliban official from Helmand who had shifted his support to the US-backed Karzai government. Yesterday his son, Hafiz Shabir Ahmed, cancelled an arranged interview with the Guardian. "I've been told not to talk about it," he said. The Taliban presence is also a matter of sensitivity for the Pakistani government. Relations with Afghanistan are at their lowest level in years following unfiltered criticism that Islamabad is doing little to close down the Taliban war machine. Last week President Hamid Karzai told a provincial gathering: "We know very well that in Pakistani madrassas, boys are being told to go to Afghanistan for jihad. They're being told to go and burn schools and clinics." Col Vernon's allegation that Quetta was a Taliban headquarters caused Pakistani official to lodge furious complaints with the British high commission, which hurriedly issued a statement distancing itself from the officer's "personal views". 'Martyrs' Pakistan argues it is being unfairly blamed for an Afghan problem. Officials say it is is impossible seal a border which is populated on both sides by Pashtun tribesmen who consider it a colonial anachronism. Up to 15,000 people pass through the main checkpost at Chaman every day, said a military spokesman, Major General Shaukat Sultan. "Everyone has a black or white turban, a shalwar kameez and a beard. Everyone looks like a Taliban. You can't arrest them all," he said.

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Pakistan has also taken other steps to address western and Afghan concerns. Posters, calendars and audio cassettes celebrating Taliban "martyrs" and Osama bin Laden have been removed from the city centre shops. Four months ago police arrested over 50 radical clerics who defied a ban on broadcasting sermons over loudspeakers. But many believe it could do more. Suspicions linger that elements within the country's intelligence services take a lacklustre approach to clamping down on the Taliban fighters that they once helped to arm and indoctrinate. Such an idea was "rubbish", said Maj Gen Sultan. A western intelligence source said that several Taliban leaders are living in Quetta, possibly including Mullah Dadullah, a one-legged cleric close to the monocular leader, Mullah Muhammad Omar. But although Pakistan has killed or detained more than 1,000 al-Qaida suspects since 2001, according to one recent report, it has only picked up a handful of Taliban militants. Until his arrest last October Taliban spokesman Abdul Latif Hakimi openly spoke with reporters from Quetta. The Taliban's true strength, however, is felt across the border. Over the past six months the insurgents have ratcheted up their campaign to overthrow President Karzai's western-backed government - an idea that once appeared quixotic but has now acquired some potency. At least 32 suicide bombs and almost daily roadside bombs so far this year reveal an enemy that is better organised, funded and motivated than ever before "It hasn't been this bad since 2001," said one westerner with several years' experience in Kandahar. "And I think it's going to get worse before it gets better." Corruption The Taliban are not the only enemy facing the 7,000-strong Nato force. Four years and billions of pounds later, the Karzai-led government and its western backers have dismally failed to draw the southern provinces into the central government. Now they are haemorrhaging support rapidly. The parlous state of central authority is most evident in Helmand. The police are corrupt, government departments defunct and, despite years of disarmament, guns are everywhere. The Taliban rule the night. Abdul Qadeer, a 38-year-old teacher, angrily brandished his work papers as he fruitlessly sought help. The Taliban had burned down his school months earlier, he said. When he started teaching again from a tent in the yard they sent another letter that read: "We kindly request you not to attend school any more or we will kill you." Mr Karzai's failure to bring real change has caused great disillusionment among the "swing voters" that the British mission hopes to woo. Last week Ghulam Sarwar, a weary looking farmer, sat in the shade of a trellis of hanging grapes as his 10-year-old nephew Abdul served tea.

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The central government was all but invisible in his life, he said, having failed to deliver promised irrigation systems and fertiliser irrigation to grow legitimate crops. "They have given us nothing so the poppy is a kind of revenge," he said. When poppy eradication teams took to the fields, slashing down crops, they sidestepped farmers with bribe money or political connections. But over half of Sarwar's crops were destroyed. "If they are going to destroy our fields there should at least be some alternative. It seems this government is against its own people." http://www.guardian.co.uk/afghanistan/story/0,,1784304,00.html

Baluchistan feeds Taliban's growing power


Declan Walsh, Chronicle Foreign Service Wednesday, May 31, 2006

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2006/05/31/MNGT1J4ULI1.DTL 05-31) 04:00 PDT Bagarzai Saidan, Pakistan -- Aziz Ullah, the serious-minded son of a Pakistani farmer, yearned for martyrdom, his family said. Last week, the Taliban made his wish come true. They inspired him to holy war, trained him to shoot, then sent him to fight the infidel Americans across the border. So it was fitting that after he died May 22, trapped under a hail of U.S. fire, a procession of black-turbaned men brought him home. "He always wanted to die like this, a heroic death. We are very proud of him," said his brother, Gul Nasib, a solemn man with a grief-etched face at their home in Bagarzai Saidan, a village in Pakistan's southwestern Baluchistan province 30 miles south of the Afghan border. Ullah died in Panjwayi, a violence-racked district of Kandahar province where U.S. A-10 Warthog planes pounded a religious school occupied by Taliban fighters. An estimated 370 people were killed, most of them Taliban soldiers like Ullah but some of them women and children, according to local reports.

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The battle was the bloodiest so far in an escalating wave of violence that has struck Afghanistan since the U.S.-led invasion ousted the Taliban from power in 2001, and raised fears that the Afghan government faces an increasingly threatening Taliban insurgency. In the past six months, insurgents have dramatically ratcheted up their campaign to overthrow the government of U.S.-backed President Hamid Karzai -- an idea that once appeared quixotic but has now acquired some potency. Ullah's funeral offered evidence that the insurgency is being bolstered from within Pakistan, the U.S.'s ostensible ally in the war on terror. A Taliban flag with black lettering fluttered at one end of his grave while the striped, black-and-white banner of Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam, an extremist Pakistani religious party that helps rule Baluchistan, protruded from the other. Hushed men from the area streamed to the site. At one point, Maulana Abdul Bari, Baluchistan's minister for public health, addressed worshipers at the village mosque. "Aziz Ullah was a true martyr; his place in paradise is guaranteed," said the radical cleric, his words echoing through a loudspeaker across the bone-dry village. "His blood will not be lost. It will strengthen Islam like water feeds a tree." What worries Western commanders and their Afghan allies is not just the intensity of the insurgency but its point of origin. According to Western and military officials, the Taliban recruit, re-supply and coordinate their war effort from Pakistan. The Afghan-Pakistan border -- a 930-mile stretch of sand, rock and mountain -- is largely not patrolled. But the most serious blind spot is Baluchistan, a vast, mostly lawless province where the Taliban draw support from local members of the Pashtun tribe. Returning from Ullah's funeral, a reporter passed groups of young men sauntering down the road or hunkered over tea at roadside cafes. Many were dressed in black baggy pants and tunics and roughly tied black turbans -- dress that is not native to Baluchistan but in Afghanistan is unambiguously associated with the Taliban. Some analysts say insurgents melt into the camps that house more than 231,000 Afghan refugees in Baluchistan. Others seek shelter in madrassas -- Islamic schools -run by local sympathizers and funded with Middle Eastern money. Major

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headquarters for the Taliban is 30 miles to the south, in the provincial capital, Quetta, according to Col. Chris Vernon, spokesman for the British forces in Iraq. During the 1980s, Quetta served as a rear base for Afghan mujahedeen fighters battling Soviet troops in Afghanistan. Today, police at check posts watch for Baluch nationalist guerrillas who have dramatically escalated a bombing campaign against the state. Government spies sit indiscreetly in the lobby of the largest hotel, the Serena, carefully tracking the movements of visiting foreigners. The Taliban move through the town like a dark whisper. Last week in the Pashtunibad district, small groups of young men with kohl under their eyes in the Pashtun fashion and silky white or black turbans on their heads strolled between the vegetable stalls and clothes traders. At the central mosque, radical cleric Maulana Abdul Wahid railed against a Jewish and Christian conspiracy against Muslims and spoke admiringly of suicide bombers. "Regardless of the cost to their lives, at least some Muslims are struggling," he told worshipers. The Taliban presence occasionally bursts into the open. On May 8, motorcycle-riding assassins gunned down Mullah Samad Barakzai, a onetime Taliban official from Afghanistan's Helmand province who had shifted his support to the U.S.-backed Karzai government. The Taliban presence is a matter of great sensitivity for the Pakistani government. Relations with Afghanistan are at their lowest level in years following a cascade of criticism that Islamabad is doing little to oppose the Taliban here. Last week, Karzai told a provincial gathering: "We know very well that in Pakistani madrassas, boys are being told to go to Afghanistan for jihad. They're being told to go and burn schools and clinics." Pakistan officials argue that they are being unfairly blamed for an Afghan problem. It is impossible, they argue, to seal a border populated on both sides by sympathetic Pashtun tribesmen. Up to 15,000 people pass through the main checkpoint at the Pakistani border town of Chaman daily, said military spokesman Maj. Gen. Shaukat Sultan. "Everyone has a black or white turban, a shalwar kameez (traditional loose-fitting Pakistani tunic and pants) and a beard. Everyone looks like a Taliban. You can't arrest them all," he said. Pakistan also has taken some steps to address Western and Afghan concerns. Posters, calendars and audio cassettes celebrating Taliban martyrs and Osama bin Laden have been removed from Quetta downtown shops. But observers say the government could do more. A Western intelligence source said several Taliban leaders are living in Quetta, and suspicions linger that elements within the country's intelligence services take a laissez-faire attitude, at best, to the existence of Taliban fighters they once helped to arm and indoctrinate -- allegations Sultan calls rubbish.

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Although Pakistan has arrested more than 1,000 al Qaeda suspects since 2001, according to a recent report by the Pak Institute for Peace Studies in Lahore, it has only arrested a handful of Taliban militants. Until his arrest in October, Taliban spokesman Abdul Latif Hakimi openly spoke with reporters from Quetta.

Where the Taliban prepare for jihad


From Abdullah Shahin in Quetta THE turbans in black or white, the long beards and the omnipresent pirhan-tunbon, the baggy trousers and long shirts that are the traditional Afghan dress, tell me Im in Afghanistan in the late 1990s, during the Taliban regime. But this is 2006, and I am in Quetta in Pakistan. Quetta, the capital of the Pakistani province of Baluchistan, lies about 125 miles southeast of Kandahar, across a porous border. Many of my fellow countrymen have made the journey here. In fact, some sections of the city seem to be populated almost entirely by Taliban who fled after the US-led invasion of Afghanistan in late 2001. Now they lie in wait in Quetta, plotting their return. Over the past year, Kandahar has seen an alarming rise in suicide bombings and attacks on troops and government installations. In the past three months, there have been more than 20 acts of violence leaving dozens dead, hundreds wounded and an entire province terrorised. Quetta provides a ready supply of young men prepared to wreak havoc in Afghanistan, local observers say. There are eight major madrassas, or Muslim religious schools, each with more than 1000 students or taliban, in the original sense of the word. In addition, there are hundreds of private madrassas , often occupying unmarked, rented houses. It is these private schools that are a major source of the fighters carrying out insurgent operations inside Kandahar, according to these observers. One 23-year-old madrassa student, wearing the black turban of the talib, spoke to me on condition of anonymity. I am preparing for jihad here until I am sent to Afghanistan, he said. Jihad is my duty and martyrdom my hope. Another Talib, 25-year-old Saadullah, explained why he had decided to wage jihad in his homeland.

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I was recruited by one of my friends who told me terrible things about the Afghan government, he said. I was also told the Americans were always abusing people, killing them, going into their homes and insulting their religion. Mullahs did their part, too, he added, preaching fiery sermons against the Afghan government and the American occupiers . Saadullah said he was dispatched on a mission to Kandahar. I was to carry out a suicide attack on an Afghan National Army base in Kandahar, he said. But at the border, the friend who was supposed to be accompanying him on the mission gave him $30, wished him luck and headed back to Quetta. I thought, Why are these people not doing jihad themselves? Theyre just taking advantage of the emotions of young people. They are liars, Saadullah recalled. I came back and I will never have anything to do with them again. With Pakistani police a rare sight in much of the city, Quetta residents say the Taliban operate with impunity. One resident called Abdullah, 40, said the city contains Taliban leaders such as military commanders Mullah Dadullah and Mullah Abdul Ali Dubandi. The whole world knows that the Taliban are trained in Pakistan but they ignore it , he said. When you walk through the streets, you hear Taliban religious songs blaring out of music stores. These incendiary chants, called tarana, call on youths to join the jihad, kill infidels and repel the occupiers. Pakistani police used to close down shops that played Taliban songs, but now nobody is afraid. The mullahs are very strong, said one shop owner. One bookseller said, The Taliban are putting out magazines. These publications used to be banned, but now theyre published openly and we sell them in our stores. When you read them, you just want to grab a gun and go to jihad. Some city residents claim that the Pakistani military is playing a role in training the would-be insurgents. The Pakistani military headquarters in Quetta is the main Taliban training base, said Tariq, 31 . Ive seen with my own eyes that Taliban were taken there for training. Military officials refused to comment on the allegation. Governor Owai Ahmad Ghani, speaking on Pakistani television, flatly denied that the Taliban were operating in Quetta and rejected claims that Pakistan was interfering in Afghanistan. The Afghan government is weak. It cant control the remote areas of its country, so it accuses Pakistan of meddling in its affairs, he said. Taliban spokesman Qari Yousuf Ahmadi said the stories of Taliban bases inside Pakistan were just propaganda.

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People think Pakistan is our friend, but it is not true, he said. Pakistan is an ally of America, not of the Taliban. The Taliban had no need of foreign bases, he insisted, adding, The Taliban are sons of Afghanistan. They are in Afghanistan and they will fight in Afghanistan. But some Pakistani politicians and analysts agree that their country is heavily involved in creating mayhem on its neighbours territory. Awrangzeb Kasi, a political analyst in Quetta, said: There have been terrorist camps in Pakistan for 26 years, where Inter Services Intelligence provides training. The Pakistani government is always saying that it supports peace in the region and that it will arrest al-Qaeda leaders, but it is really not doing anything. This article is published courtesy of the Institute for War and Peace Reporting 12 March 2006http://www.sundayherald.com/54534

Suspicions of Taliban in Pakistan


June 10, 2006

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan (AP) - When Taliban militant Syed Azizullah died during fighting in southern Afghanistan, his body was sent to his native Pakistan where a provincial official gave a eulogy before hundreds of Pashtun tribesmen. A flag of the Islamist militia fluttered by the grave. Pakistan strenuously denies granting sanctuary to the Taliban, yet their cause still finds succor among Pakistani Pashtuns and Islamic hardliners, fueling suspicions jihadi leaders may be plotting their campaign of violence from southwestern Pakistan, with militants crossing the long, porous border to launch attacks. Pakistan denies that and insists it does all it can to combat militancy. It has deployed 80,000 troops to fight al-Qaida and local Taliban militants in its own Waziristan tribal areas farther north - a suspected hiding place of accused terrorist mastermind Osama bin Laden - and has lost hundreds of soldiers in fighting there. But it appears far less active in tracking down Taliban in Baluchistan province, where Azizullah was buried opposite southern Afghan regions where recent months' surge in attacks has sparked the heaviest fighting since the Taliban's ouster from power in late 2001.

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Afghan officials accuse Pakistan's intelligence agencies, former supporters of the Taliban regime, of being behind the violence that has seriously shaken Afghan President Hamid Karzai's feeble authority in a former Taliban heartland. Western diplomats doubt there's Pakistani state backing for the militants but with NATO forces from Canada, Britain and the Netherlands deploying in the Afghan south and facing suicide attacks and roadside bombings almost daily, diplomatic pressure is growing on Pakistan to crack down on its side of the arid, lawless frontier. The NATO forces said Pakistan's security forces currently appear more concerned with stamping out Baluch tribal militants, who are disrupting crucial natural gas supplies in the province with guerrilla attacks. "The government is forceful in FATA (federally administered tribal areas, including Waziristan) and appears to be turning a blind eye in Baluchistan," one Islamabadbased diplomat said on condition of anonymity. "The message is sent to the government of Pakistan that a lot more could be done." That message, however, is a mixed one, tempered by respect for Pakistan's anti-terror successes against al-Qaida in the last four years, arresting hundreds of militants, including key figures like Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, the planner of the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks on the United States. When the chief of staff for British forces in southern Afghanistan told the Guardian newspaper last month Baluchistan's capital Quetta was the Taliban militant campaign's "headquarters," the British Embassy in Pakistan swiftly moved to distance itself from the comments. The presence of Taliban leaders in Quetta, which is heavily populated by Afghan migrants, is hard to substantiate. The clearest public sign was the arrest there last October of a Taliban spokesman, Latif Hakimi, who lived in the city with his family. One Afghan with ties to the Taliban said Taliban provincial commanders for southern Afghanistan spend most of their time in Quetta and have regular "shuras" or councils to discuss the insurgency with district commanders. The Afghan, who spoke on condition of anonymity citing concerns for his safety, said he had attended a shura two months ago in the city, along with 120 Taliban and three young men volunteered for "suicide attacks against infidels." He also claimed the Taliban hold training camps in Quetta to train militants on how to make and plant bombs. Afghan officials enraged Pakistan by publicizing similar allegations in February, when Karzai handed Pakistan's President Gen. Pervez Musharraf a dossier on the reported whereabouts in Pakistan of alleged terror training camps and Taliban and alQaida suspects.

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Pakistan said most of the information was wrong or old and did not lead to any significant arrests. "As far as we are concerned, there are no Taliban leaders there (in Quetta)," said Pakistan's army spokesman, Maj.-Gen. Shaukat Sultan. "If anyone has actionable intelligence, they should provide it and we will act on it." A second western diplomat said the possibility Taliban leaders are in Quetta does not mean it is their hub of operations for southern Afghanistan, where more than 400 people have died in fighting in three weeks, many in U.S. air strikes. "We can't conclude that a Taliban shura in Quetta is running the campaign in Afghanistan. If you can put in a force big enough to get 80 killed in Kandahar, the simplest explanation is that they are running their campaign there," he said. Like the first diplomat, he requested anonymity. "Maybe they (Taliban leaders) are in Pakistan, maybe they're in Afghanistan. Most likely they keep moving around," he said. "Neither government controls the (border) area." But the open, pro-Taliban sympathies of Pashtun tribesmen and religious hardliners illustrated at the May 23 funeral of Syed Azizullah - inspire little confidence in Pakistani government declarations that it does all it can to curb Taliban militancy. Among the speakers at his funeral at the village Bagarzai, 50 kilometres north of Quetta, was Maulana Abdul Bari, public health engineering minister in Baluchistan's provincial government. He extolled Azizullah for "fighting in the way of Allah" and "against infidel forces in Afghanistan," said local businessman Asghar Khan, who added he heard the eulogy. Information Minister Matiullah Agha also attended. Both are members of Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam, a hardline Islamic party that is the dominant partner a coalition government in Baluchistan, the poorest of Pakistan's four provinces. Maulvi Noor Mohammed, a JUI legislators, said it is every Muslim's duty to support the Taliban in fighting the United States and its allies in Afghanistan, although the party itself wasn't sending people to fight and offered the militants only moral and political backing. Asked why JUI leaders attended the funeral of Azizullah, who was reported to have died in a U.S. air strike on a village in Kandahar province that killed dozens of militants, Mohammed explained: "He was a local person, he was martyred by infidels and he was a Muslim brother." http://cnews.canoe.ca/CNEWS/World/2006/06/10/1624923-ap.html

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PAKISTAN: MP CALLS ON FAITHFUL TO JOIN TALIBAN IN AFGHANISTAN

(AKI) - Quetta, 30 May 2006 (by Syed Saleem Shahzad) - As brutal clashes continue between the US-led coalition forces and the Taliban in southern Afghanistan, across the border in neighbouring Pakistan, Maulana Noor Mohammed a respected Muslim scholar, leader of the hardline religious party, Jamiat-i-Ulema-i-Islam and member of Pakistan's national assembly has called on Muslims in Pakistan to actively support the Taliban militants in their fight against the American forces. In an exclusive interview, Noor Mohammed told Adnkronos International (AKI) that there was enough of an historical basis for Pakistan to rally such support for the Taliban.

The Taliban movement appears to be resurgent in southern Afghanistan, carrying out fierce attacks on US-led coalition forces as well as on Afghan National Army positions. Some analysts believe that the hardline movement is once again in a position to regain power in Afghanistan, as long as it can secure the same level of support it received from neighbouring Pakistan in the mid-1990s, when the students from Pakistani Islamic seminaries flooded into Afghanistan to reinforce the Taliban. The US-led campaign in Afghanistan, compelled many pro-Taliban forces in Pakistan to remain neutral and not express their support for a long time. However ever since the Taliban began its spring offensive, many of its former patrons have defied this and started a heated debate on whether or not Pakistan should support the Taliban movement in 2006, arguing that the Muslims of the sub-continent have a long history of supporting Muslim movements, especially in Afghanistan. The elderly and respected Muslim scholar, Maulana Noor Mohammed is one such person. A member of Pakistan's national assembly from Quetta, the capital of the restive Baluchistan province, Noor Mohammed is also a member of the hardline religious party, Jamiat-i-Ulema-i-Islam (JUI). The JUI is led by Maulana Fazlur Rehman, the head of Pakistan's parliamentary opposition, the six-party religious alliance MMA. Although the JUI and its leadership in Baluchistan have specified that they want to keep their distance from the Taliban movement and one the groups leaders Maulana Sherani even insisted that no Taliban should be allowed within party ranks, Maulana Noor Mohammed insisted that firm support for the Taliban should be order of the day. "The JUI has a centuries-old legacy of backing reformist movements and movements which were launched against oppression," said Maulana Noor Mohammed, while sitting in his office in Quetta.

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"After the partition of British India, the Jamiat-i-Ulema-i-Hind was transformed into the Jamiat-i-Ulema-i-Islam and the leadership finally came into the hands of Maulana Fazlur Rehman," he said. "You can see what this whole legacy was all about. Jihad and the fight against oppression and the support for Muslim movements. This is what the JUI constitution speaks for," said Noor Mohammed. "To strive for the safeguard of Islam, Islamic tenets and the heart of Islam...to provide support to Muslims in occupied territories and to support Muslim minorities in nonMuslim majority areas," he said reading from the JUI constitution. "Now is there any mention that JUI would support Muslim movements only in Pakistan?," Noor Mohammed queried: "In the past the Jamiat-i-Ulema-i-Hind launched a Caliphate movement for the Muslims of Turkey. When the British attacked Afghanistan [in the early 1900s], we supported the Afghan rulers and sent our leaders like [theologian and freedom fighter ] Ubaidullah Sindhi who stayed there [Kabul] for 7 years and worked for the liberation of Afghanistan," he said. "Afghan rulers always appreciated the role of the Deoband scholars [such as Ubaidullah Sindhi] for the liberation of Afghanistan," he added. Deoband is a powerful Islamic school which was established more than 150 years ago in India. It was developed as a reaction to the British colonialism in India, which they believed was assimilating the Islamic religion. The Deoband school promotes a radical brand of Islam which is said to have inspired the Taliban in Afghanistan. "Similarly we had a role when the former USSR invaded Afghanistan and our leader Maulana Mufti Mehmood issued a religious decree in favour of the Afghan jihad and even when the Taliban emerged we supported them," he said. "So the question is why not now when Bush and his allies have launched a wicked crusade against Muslims," he said. "Should we not support the Taliban movement because a mean [Pakistani President] General Musharraf is our ruler and he has turned the Pakistan Army into a US force which captured 600 Muslim Mujahids [Muslim warriors who fights to defend or expand Muslim lands] and handed them over to the US?" he questioned. "The six parties religious alliance should take a clear policy about the Taliban movement - whether it supports the Taliban or not," he said. "When the Americans threatened to invade Afghanistan we formed Pakistan-Afghanistan Defense Council, so now what is the point of retreating?" he asked. "I have spoken to the MMA leadership and have asked for debate in the upcoming session of the MMA on announcing clear support for mujahadeen all over the world, including the Taliban," he said. "The six parties religious alliance MMA and the mujahadeen are the opposition force of the day against Bush and his allies. Those who have another opinion on the MMA's role other than that, are simply Bush's allies," Noor Mohammed insisted. http://www.adnki.com/index_2Level_English.php?cat=Security&loid=8.0.304049580 &par=0

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http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/world/archives/2003/09/25/2003069172

Taliban leaders alive and well in Pakistan


COMEBACK: TheTaliban forces and their al-Qaeda allies, once chased away by invading US forces, are returning to Afghanistan to wreak havoc and stir up insurgency AP , GHAZNI, AFGHANISTAN Thursday, Sep 25, 2003,Page 5 Intercepted phone calls show Taliban commanders have been orchestrating deadly attacks here and in other parts of Afghanistan from a safe haven across the border in Pakistan, a senior Afghan intelligence official said. The resurgent Taliban forces who were chased from Afghanistan two years ago by the US-led war -- are getting protection from Islamic hardline politicians and rogue elements of Pakistani security, Afghan and Western officials charge. President Hamid Karzai, in a speech Tuesday to the UN, said that from "cross-border militant infiltrations to hateful teachings at places disguised as madrassas (Islamic religious schools), terrorism continues to make inroads into the space of peace and prosperity." Ghazni province, southwest of Kabul, has been on the front lines of the recent violence, and many residents say the local government and security officials have been unable or unwilling to end the insurgency. Former Taliban walk the streets of this hardscrabble town, hiding only behind a change of clothes. They boldly tried to assassinate the police chief last week and have turned the back roads into a gauntlet of fear for aid workers.

Members of the Pakistani Frontier Corps patrol the Pakistani-Afghan border at Chaman, 125km from the Balouchistan provincial capital of Quetta. The situation is tense as border security has been beefed

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up along the porous Safe haven frontier, which Afghan officials say is easily It was here in Ghazni province that four workers for a traversed by Taliban Danish charity were executed by Taliban rebels on Sept. 8; operatives based in here where three Red Crescent workers met a similar fate Pakistan. in August. In Zabul province, 220km to the southwest, PHOTO: EPA rebels battled for weeks through the deep gorges and craggy mountain peaks against an onslaught of American air power and more than 1,000 Afghan soldiers. A Sept. 8 order for Taliban fighters in Zabul to retreat during US bombing came in a satellite phone call from a commander in Quetta, the capital of Pakistan's southwestern Baluchistan province, the senior Afghan official privy to sensitive intelligence said on condition of anonymity. A similar phone call was placed to Quetta in March by Taliban fighters who had stopped a Red Cross vehicle on a dusty road in Afghanistan's Helmand province. The voice on the other end of the phone was a senior Taliban fugitive commander, Mullah Dadullah, who gave the order to execute an El Salvadoran national, a survivor of the attack, the intelligence official said in a weekend interview. The brother of Baluchistan's health minister was arrested this month for alleged Taliban ties and accused of plotting to kill a relative of the governor of Afghanistan's southern Kandahar province, which borders Baluchistan. "We have this impression that Quetta and surrounding areas are being used by hardcore Taliban forces," Afghan Interior Minister Ali Ahmad Jalali said in an interview in his Kabul office. Zalmai Rassoul, Afghanistan's national security adviser, told reporters the insurgency is being directed almost entirely from abroad -- with Pakistani religious schools teaching jihad, and officials failing to crack down. "When the Taliban was first defeated, they were on the run, but they have had time in Pakistan to get a rest and reorganize themselves," he said. "And now they are being incited and encouraged to come back to Afghanistan." Pakistani officials strongly deny that the Taliban are receiving sanctuary in their territory. "There is no truth to the allegations that Taliban have bases in Quetta to harm the interests of President Hamid Karzai's government," Brigadier Javed Iqbal Cheema said Tuesday. As head of the Interior Ministry's crisis unit, Cheema is in charge of cooperating with the US in the war on terrorism. Switching sides

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Pakistan was a strong supporter of the Taliban regime, but switched sides following the Sept. 11 attacks and has become a key ally of the US. Still, rogue elements of the military and intelligence services are believed to have maintained old allegiances. The sharp rise in attacks comes as the West scrambles to increase its commitment in the country, a change of heart that analysts complain may be too-little-too-late after two years of foot-dragging. US President George W. Bush earlier this month asked Congress for an additional US$800 million for Afghan reconstruction, and NATO last week began assessing whether to expand a 5,000-strong peacekeeping mission beyond the capital, Kabul. In Ghazni, Mohammed Chaos Aolya, the director of the Red Crescent Society here, said police were slow to react when he received an urgent phone call on Aug. 13 from a frantic worker injured in the Taliban attack. "They are all afraid to do anything," Aolya said. "The police didn't want to come with us to the area, so I myself went and brought the dead bodies back and tended to the wounded." Aolya said that anybody familiar with the province knows that "Taliban and al-Qaeda walk around freely during the day." He said Taliban supporters no longer wear the black turbans favored by the religious militia during its rule, but don't otherwise do much to hide. He also blamed the US for not doing enough to eradicate the group. "They have cut down the Taliban but they have left the roots remaining, and now this plague is growing back," he said, adding that nearly all shipments of blankets and food to the region have been halted since the attack on his workers. "Ghazni is a poor province. This is hurting every man, woman and child," he said. This story has been viewed 3032 times.

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http://www.time.com/time/asia/magazine/article/0,13673,501030721-464487,00.html

Undefeated
On the Afghanistan-Pakistan border, the Taliban are regrouping, bent on spreading terror BY PHIL ZABRISKIE / SPIN BOLDAK

Monday, Jul. 14, 2003 Commander Mamabaidullah switches off the ignition and alights from his pickup truck onto the desert plain surrounding Spin Boldak, a chaotic Afghan town that borders Pakistan. Followed by four of his Kalashnikovtoting men, he walks briskly toward a KATE BROOKS/POLARIS FOR TIME graveyard where scores of bodies lie At Large: The Taliban roam freely in buried beneath mounds of dirt and Quetta, Pakistan clay. Mamabaidullah, who is responsible for guarding this stretch of frontier between Afghanistan and Pakistan, stops at the row closest to the border. With evident pride, he explains that they contain the corpses of Taliban militiamen killed by Afghan soldiers during a battle last month. These Taliban, Mamabaidullah says, had been hiding in Pakistan and returned to attack a government office in a nearby village. Officially, 40 Taliban died in the ensuing firefight, though a source present at the encounter and an official in Kabul both put the death toll, which included seven Afghan soldiers, nearer to 90. It was one of the Taliban's biggest defeats since they were toppled in December 2001. Mamabaidullah had these bodies buried here to send a message "that if anyone comes into Afghanistan to kill or make problems, they'll end up like this." The Taliban, however, show no intention of heeding his crude warning. In the past month, militants belonging to or affiliated with the Taliban have launched scores of rockets at U.S. military bases and detonated explosives in several Afghan cities. They have ambushed American and Afghan troops and torched newly rebuilt schools. During the last week of June, Taliban combatants temporarily seized government offices in a remote part of Zabul province. On June 30 a Taliban operative planted an antipersonnel mine in a Kandahar mosque run by a pro-government cleric; the subsequent blast wounded 17 worshipers. The next day, an anti-Taliban mullah was killed by a shot to the head.

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A year ago, notes Masood Khalili, once a leader of the anti-Taliban Northern Alliance and now Afghanistan's ambassador to India, "the Taliban were scared, broken and disconcerted. Now they are forming again, slowly, gradually, like a photograph developing." The big picture, according to Kandahar's police chief Brigadier General Mohammed Akram, is that "the Taliban are stronger now than at any time since the fall of their government." These neo-Taliban number in the "thousands," according to an Afghan security official in Kabul. They operate primarily out of Pakistan, guided by many of the same menincluding supreme leader Mullah Mohammed Omar who ran Afghanistan's ultra-orthodox theocracy from 1995 through 2001, when the group harbored Osama bin Laden and lent eager support to al-Qaeda. While maintaining close ties to al-Qaeda, the Taliban have also forged a deepening alliance with Afghan warlord Gulbuddin Hekmatyar and his fundamentalist, vehemently antiWestern Hizb-i-Islami party, which remains potent in eastern Afghanistan. Afghan government officials, including President Hamid Karzai, and members of the U.S.-led Joint Coalition Task Force have downplayed recent attacks. Karzai tells Time that the Taliban are not regrouping: "Any internal danger is from terrorism and from al-Qaeda organizing from outside." Coalition spokesman Colonel Rodney Davis agrees: "The coalition has degraded what was a formidable force." True enough. But the Taliban have taken what was left of their own army and morphed it into a guerrilla-and-terror outfit. Their goal, says Afghanistan expert Professor Barnett Rubin of New York University's (NYU) Center on International Cooperation, is to "cause enough terror that the foreigners will leave Afghanistan and Afghans will be afraid to collaborate with the government in Kabul, causing it to crumble." That's likely beyond their reach, but in a country as unstable as Afghanistan, even degraded Taliban fighters are a lethal threat. Mamabaidullah's office overlooks one of this battle's front lines: Spin Boldak's main border checkpoint, a notorious smugglers' route from the Pakistani town of Chaman. Entering or leaving the country often requires no papers at all. "It's impossible to control," says Khalid Pashtoon, spokesman for Kandahar Governor Gul Agha Sherzai. It's also the Taliban's gateway to revenge. Following their ouster from Afghanistan, most Taliban leaders found sanctuary among fellow ethnic Pashtuns in Pakistan's lawless Baluchistan and North-West Frontier Province (N.W.F.P.) regions. Pakistani authorities have arrested nearly 500 suspected al-Qaeda members, but Karzai, among others, has charged that the U.S.'s avowed ally has shown little inclination to apprehend top-level Taliban, even when provided addresses where they could be found. "If we had sincere and honest cooperation from Pakistan," charges the security official in Kabul, "there'd be no Taliban threat in Afghanistan." After the battle near Spin Boldak, Mamabaidullah made the point less delicately by piling more than 20 bodies onto a dump truck, driving to the border and depositing them on Pakistani soil. Faisal Saleh Hayat, Pakistan's Interior Minister, insists that "our focus is equally on al-Qaeda and on the Taliban." President Pervez Musharraf has praised his security forces for capturing 10 Taliban leaders. He also sent Pakistani soldiers into parts of N.W.F.P. where they hadn't been "for over a century." But that late-June campaign stemmed from reports that bin Laden was in the area. A Pakistani intelligence source near Chaman says his orders are "not to harass nor appease" the Taliban but to let them be. Essentially, the Taliban have returned to the cradle in which they were nurtured a decade ago with funding and training by Pakistan's powerful Inter-Services

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Intelligence agency (ISI). (Accusations persist that rogue ISI agents or ex-agents still back the Taliban.) The border provinces are controlled by Jamiat Ulema Islam, an extremist party that openly harbors the Taliban. In Quetta, 110 kilometers southeast of Chaman, men roam the streets wearing the distinctive black or white robes and black or white turbans characteristic of the Taliban. "We feel relaxed and safe here," says a young Talib. A local cleric says Taliban commanders meet regularly in the town to plan raids into their former domain. Foot soldiers "operate in twos and threes," says a trader who works on both sides of the border. "They sneak across, carry out attacks and come back." Mullah Omar himself is believed to be moving throughout Baluchistan and southwestern Afghanistan. Taliban spokesman Mohammed Mukhtar Mujahid, who is also at large, says Omar communicates with acolytes via recorded or written messages. Mujahid recently announced that Omar had formed a ten-man "leadership council" and assigned each lieutenant a specific region to destabilize. This guerrilla war cabinet includes Saifur Rahman Mansoor, who led Taliban forces against British and U.S. troops during Operation Anaconda in early 2002, and Mullah Dadullah Akhund, the one-legged intelligence chief who ordered the execution of a Salvadorean International Committee of the Red Cross worker in Uruzgan province in March. While rallying old soldiers, the Taliban are also recruiting new members, targeting disgruntled young Afghans in refugee camps in Chaman, Quetta, Peshawar and Karachi. The appeals play on pride and alienation, charging that the Americans are denigrating Islam and Pashtuns. "You are seeing the picture of a dirty Jewish infidel searching the body of a Muslim woman," reads a flyer found in Chaman, which shows a Western soldier frisking a burqa-clad female. "If a Muslim does not display his feelings by defending his faith and honor, then he is not a Muslim nor an Afghan." Karzai favors reintegrating low-level Taliban into Afghan society. But Mullah Khaksar, an ex-Taliban minister who later allied himself with the Northern Alliance, says Talibs are warned by their peers that "they'll be sent to Guantnamo" if they return. Or, he adds, "[the Taliban] pay people to join their jihad." Mullah Nik Mohammed, a Taliban commander captured in Spin Boldak, told his interrogators that he would have received $850 for detonating a bomb, double that if it killed a civilian, and $2,600 for taking a soldier's life. The Taliban's most dangerous ally, however, appears to be the warlord Hekmatyar. He, like the Taliban leaders, is a Pashtun with a fundamentalist interpretation of Islam and a hatred for the Americans and Karzai. His guerrilla fighting skills seduced the CIA and Pakistan into giving him billions of dollars of support and arms during the Soviet occupation. In May 2002, however, the U.S. tried to kill him with a Hellfire missile strike, and coalition soldiers have launched several operations in his traditional strongholds of Nangarhar and Kunar provinces. A diplomat in Kabul believes Taliban leaders don't trust Hekmatyar, whose treachery is legendary even by the spectacularly duplicitous standards of Afghan warfare. But a former Taliban financier in Chaman says Hizb-i-Islami has forged ties with "mid-ranking commanders and ordinary Taliban," providing cash and motorcycles for cross-border attacks.

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Singapore-based al-Qaeda expert Rohan Gunaratna asserts that the two groups are much more closely linked, that bin Laden himself oversaw the formation of their alliance "soon after U.S. troops entered Afghanistan. But now this understanding has become very deep. There's integration between the organizations." It amounts to a division of labor: the Taliban focus on southern Afghanistan and Hizb-i-Islami on the east, which frees al-Qaeda "to use its limited strength for operations overseas," explains Gunaratna. (Several U.S. and Afghan intelligence sources, however, suspect al-Qaeda engineered a June 7 suicide bombing in Kabul that killed four German peacekeeping soldiers and an Afghan teenager.) Outgunned on the home front, the Taliban mainly engage in hit-and-run skirmishes. Sergeant David Smith, who is stationed at a U.S. firebase in Paktika province, says his unit has encountered amateur warriors who forgot to pull the pins from the grenades they threw. But the unit has also faced highly trained professional soldiers. Recalling a clash in April, he says, "Those guys knew what they were doing. I have to give 'em props." Facing a more elusive enemy, coalition forces are also trying to adaptby increasing their humanitarian efforts. Four Provincial Reconstruction Teams have been deployed by U.S. and British forces. They patrol, liaise with local leaders and work with NGOs to distribute school and building supplies, dig wells and repair bridges. "It is crucial," says Colonel Davis, "that we show measurable, visible progress in terms of stability and reconstruction." A school or clinic built by the coalition, NGOs or local government can have a huge impact on a village, providing not only services but also a rebuttal to the Taliban's call to jihad. In Tani, a village in Khost province a few kilometers from the border with Pakistan, parents say school enrollment has doubled, and a 14-year-old boy excitedly describes a curriculum that now includes science, math and English. At a fruit stand in Logar province, Shakur, 60, says his village now has a medical clinic. The Taliban, he says, "did nothing for this country." But the hope generated by billions of dollars in promised aid has been dampened by the lack of significant progress on large-scale, job-producing projects such as repairing the nation's horrendous roads. Meanwhile, the country continues to suffer from numerous potentially crippling problems: corruption and lawlessness are pervasive; civil servants often don't get paid; Karzai's power is largely limited to Kabul; warlords rule the countryside; the Afghan National Army is years from being a legitimate security force; and Finance Minister Ashraf Ghani is warning that the massive proliferation of poppy production threatens to turn Afghanistan into a narcostate. Among many diplomats, aid workers and Afghan officials, there is a growing sense of foreboding. "Everyone can see very little is happening and that, evidently, the U.S. is not serious about its so-called commitment to reconstruct Afghanistan," says NYU's Professor Rubin. A recent Council on Foreign Relations and Asia Society report, Afghanistan: Are We Losing the Peace?, warns, "Failure to stem deteriorating security conditions and to spur economic reconstruction could lead to a reversion to warlord-dominated anarchy and mark a major defeat for the U.S. war on terrorism." Gunaratna, for one, believes a revitalized Taliban operating with relative freedom in Pakistan not only undermines the new Afghan government but also feeds the risk of terrorism abroad. "Al-Qaeda is able to survive because of its link with the Taliban," he says. In short, they are still harboring al-Qaedabut in Pakistan, not Afghanistan.

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For the Taliban, there is currency in every gripe, every unfulfilled promise, every report of American troops kicking in doors during village raids, every hired gun looking for work. "Just returning to Afghanistan is a victory for the Taliban," says Masood Khalili, Kabul's ambassador to India. But they clearly want more. "We are waiting," says Qari Rehman, a Talib in Chaman. "You will see. The situation will get worse." With reporting by Ghulam Hasnain/Chaman and Quetta, Wahid Mayar/Jalalabad, Tim McGirk/Kabul, Michael Ware/Kandahar and Rahimullah Yusufzai/Peshawar
From the Jul. 21, 2003 issue of TIME Asia Magazine

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Read Editorials of National newspapers on Financial Mismanagement and looting of wealth by Pro-Taliban Regime in Balochistan backed by ISI.

EDITORIAL- Jun 22, 2006. Balochistan budget

As expected, Balochistan has unveiled a deficit budget for the fourth year running. The shortfall this time is Rs10.96 billion a staggering sum for the cash-strapped provincial government which hopes to bridge the gap through austerity measures, local resource generation and federal grants. The official document presented on Tuesday put the size of the budget at Rs59.69 billion, a puzzling figure given that total expenditure added up to no more than Rs48.27 billion. The error was, however, rectified the following day. But on one count at least there was no confusion whatsoever: Balochistans fiscal health continues to deteriorate with each passing year. The severity of the financial crunch facing the province can be gauged from the fact that there is no provision in the budget for new development-related investment, with the Rs10.82 billion outlay for this sector earmarked exclusively for the completion or implementation of the existing projects. Even this allocation may be unrealistic. The provinces contribution to development spending is projected at roughly 65 per cent but how this money will be generated is anybodys guess. Balochistan is currently reeling under a debt burden of Rs62 billion, including some Rs17 billion owed to the State Bank of Pakistan. From all accounts, the province is caught in a serious debt trap with no hope in sight of self-sufficiency. As such, a substantial loan write-off is an option that ought to be considered by the federal government whose own coffers receive a huge annual fillip, estimated at Rs78 billion, courtesy the products of Balochistans gas fields. At the same time, there has been no movement on addressing the provinces long-standing demand that it be given its due share of past revenues generated by gas-fuelled industrialisation. Instead, the centre is quick to deduct Balochistans current dues at source, even from foreign-funded development grants. Also pending is the no small matter of the Rs9 billion said to be owed by Sindh under the head of Hub river water. Such inequitable treatment is further fuelling resentment in an already politically volatile province. http://www.dawn.com/2006/06/22/ed.htm#2

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EDITORIAL; Jun 22, 2006. Balochistan's shaky finances

Balochistan's budget indicates the province's precarious financial condition and shows just how harmful violence and conflict have been to economic activity. This is disturbing because poverty and an impoverished economy with the unemployment rate of over 30 per cent would further fuel the simmering discontent and resentment among many Baloch against the federal government and its policies. A major problem with the budget for the 2006-07 fiscal year is that it has a massive deficit of Rs10.963 billion. Considering the total projected outlay of Rs59.69 billion, the deficit is over 18 per cent of the planned expenditure for the next year. The obvious question that comes to mind is that how such a large deficit will be financed. The answer to this, as given by the province's finance minister Syed Ehsan Shah, who presented the budget in the Balochistan assembly on Tuesday, is that it will be met by "austerity measures, local resource generation and federal grants". But meeting a gap in financing of nearly eleven billion rupees seems a tall order, unless of course the province undertakes some serious austerity measures -- something that governments in this country, of whatever ideological and political hue, are usually unable to do. What eventually happens is that cuts are made in expenditure. The provincial minister is saying that non-development expenditure will be trimmed, but the reality is that very often development schemes are affected more. The budget presents a dismal picture of the country's poorest and most backward province. As usual there is overwhelming -- clearly too much -- dependence on the centre with federal revenue receipts (estimated at Rs33.8 billion) almost 14 times more than what the province expects to generate from its own resources. With projected provincial tax revenue estimated at Rs880 million, Balochistan's ability to raise tax revenue on its own leaves much to be desired. But another view on this would be that the province has not seen much economic activity and incomes are stagnant or falling, which is why tax receipts are so low. The Rs37.45 billion set aside for non-development expenditure is a far greater amount than the Rs10.82 billion allocated to development expenditure. This anomaly is tragic given that the need for development in Balochistan is perhaps the most acute compared to all other provinces. A sizeable amount of Rs3.8 billion has been allocated to the law-enforcement agencies. Last year's Rs3.4 billion did not seem well-spent considering that law and order in the province was not very good. Natural gas is an important source of revenue for Balochistan. The finance minister said that while there had been an increase in proceeds from gas royalty and central excise duty, there was a "serious shortfall" of Rs1.718 billion on the gas development surcharge (GDS). The province is currently engaged in a dispute with Sindh over the GDS and Islamabad should listen to the finance minister's plea to intervene and settle the matter. Balochistan has the lowest per capita income among all the provinces, and its Rs9,144 as mentioned in the budget documents is less than a quarter of the national average. Given that violence in the province is not about to end any time soon and the federal government is unwilling for now to renegotiate a new expanded NFC award or engage in serious

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dialogue to address the autonomy issue, the future looks bleak for Balochistan. That is, unless the federal government takes the bold initial step of at least writing off part, if not all, of the province's Rs17 billion debt with the State Bank of Pakistan. http://www.thenews.com.pk/daily_detail.asp?id=12036

Jun 22, 2006. Balochistan remarks President Pervez Musharraf's remarks to the Balochistan governor at his Army House camp office in Rawalpindi on Monday that "terrorism has been eliminated" from the province merit some comment. The president told the governor that life was returning to normal in Dera Bugti and the surrounding areas and that those displaced by the violence were now returning to their homes. He said no one would be allowed to come in the way of Balochistan's development and the government had allocated extra funds for the development of the province's backward areas for 2006-07. There should be no two opinions on the fact that those who destroy electricity pylons, bomb bridges and rail tracks or launch rockets into thickly populated areas must be dealt with severely by the government. However, to say that terrorism has been eliminated from the province is to say that all such attacks will no longer happen in future. Here then one would have to ask the president if anything has dramatically changed in the past few weeks vis--vis Islamabad's policies on Balochistan for such a claim to be made. On the face of it, one would have to say the answer is a resounding 'no'. The setting aside of "extra funds" for developing the province's backward areas needs to be seen in a larger context. The share of the federal divisible pool for each of the four provinces, in terms of percentage, may not have changed but in absolute terms all provinces are going to receive more than what they have in the past, because the pool itself has increased. This is a normal outcome of increased GDP growth and does not really mean that the federal government is making any extra concessions to Balochistan or to any of the other provinces for that matter. In fact, in recent days, the finance minister of the province has publicly complained that there would not be enough money to pay for a planned increase in the salaries of provincial government employees. Also, all the three smaller provinces have been reiterating that the criteria for division of the federal divisible pool as set by the National Finance Commission award needs to be revised away from an emphasis on population density to give greater weight to backwardness. Now let's take a look at the political situation in the province. The fact is that the media has not been allowed to move freely in the areas which have been most affected by the violence, namely Kohlu and Dera Bugti districts. Hence the claimed that the latter is returning to normality and people who had been displaced are returning to their homes is coming only from the side of the federal government. To some extent this may be true because it is human nature to want to live in peace and without feeling a constant risk to one's personal security. However, what the president is saying completely ignores the crux of the matter, and that is the grievances held by the people of Balochistan. Now, whether a sardar (who denies education to his subjects) is a focal point in the

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expression of these grievances does not matter the fact remains that there is much resentment against Islamabad and Punjab among many ordinary Baloch. They feel disempowered, that all decisions affecting them are taken in Islamabad, that their due share of the royalties from Sui gas is denied to them and that the NFC award gives an unfairly high proportion of funds to Punjab. Even the development projects in Balochistan, they say, do not provide too much in the form of new job opportunities because much of the staff is hired from the other provinces. Two commissions were formed to inquire into these grievances, one headed by PML-Q secretarygeneral Senator Mushahid Hussain and the other, on possible constitutional reforms, headed by Senator Wasim Sajjad. They began with much fanfare but no one knows what happened after. Instead of making such claims, which may seem hard to come good, it would be good if President Musharraf takes stock of the recommendations made by these commissions and acts on them. Besides, the reported contact between Nawab Akbar Bugti and the federal government via the MMA as intermediary needs to be strengthened and consolidated into a formal dialogue. The violence will end only if these issues are resolved. Mere announcements are no help. http://www.thenews.com.pk/daily_detail.asp?id=11786

Wednesday, June 21, 2006

EDITORIAL: All quiet in Balochistan?

President General Pervez Musharraf said on Monday that life was returning to normal in Dera Bugti and nearby areas because terrorists have been eliminated from Balochistan. Since he was speaking to the Balochistan governor, Awais Ahmed Ghani, some hyperbole was to be expected. His next claim that no one would be allowed to hinder the development of the province should be taken with an equal pinch of salt because that requires overturning long-settled economic practices of the province. As for the return of displaced persons to the areas, the claim that Balochistan has been pacified will have to be proved first. A section of the Bugtis has returned with great caution and under federal pressure and protection, but it will take just one major incident to make them flee again. The evidence for the pacification of Balochistan is not strong. The Balochistan Liberation Army (BLA) has not ended its operations and the big sardars are still challenging the writ of the state through statements and disruptive action on the ground. Acts of sabotage against public projects have not stopped and those who are inclined to go against the terrorists are being picked off by the rebels. State employees who show enthusiasm in their work and thus displease the liberation movement walk in fear of the consequences of their betrayal. Above all, the linkage of insurgency with Baloch nationalism is nowhere near being broken by the efforts made in Islamabad. The nature of this outbreak of nationalism is not just

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fundamentally economic, uniting the Baloch part of the population with a diversified Pushtun majority, but also fed by a discernable foreign hand. The insurgency will end only if those who lead it become politically isolated in the province and are cut off from the source of money and weapons. The rhetoric and sentiment of nationalism in Balochistan is economy-based because of the awareness of the people that Islamabad derives its major economic resources from the province. Almost in pattern with all such provinces in the world, nationalism has acquired the sharpness of separatism, which has an exaggerated effect on a centre that has been obsessed with unity in past history. One would be utterly negative if one ignored the present governments increased attention to Balochistans economic plight. The 2004-05 budget of the province was Rs 26 billion, the one in 2005-06 was already Rs 42 billion, but as always close to 94 per cent of the revenue flowed from the federal government, either as its share from the divisible pool of taxes, as straight transfers, or as subvention grants for its backwardness. Only six per cent of revenues are raised inside Balochistan. Quetta complains that it pays out half a billion rupees every month to the State Bank for the overdrafts it has to rely on to meet its expenses. Yet its gas is worth many more billions than it demands as share in the national income. President Musharrafs opinion that the insurgency has ended in Balochistan must spring from the awareness that his action in Balochistan has not been the quick surgical strike the world thought it would be. The longer it takes to decide the discord in the province the more difficult it will become to pacify it. The insurgents are aware that external elements are dying to play a role in the region and are not averse to taking advantage of them. The first external factor over which there is a constant argument in Islamabad is Pakistans own involvement in the Taliban option in Afghanistan. Relations with the Karzai government have deteriorated because of exchange of recriminations over Pakistans interference or non-interference in Afghanistan. But the presence of the Taliban in Quetta complicates the issue of the provinces pacification. India has denied being an actor in Balochistans trouble but it has officially expressed concern over military action there. Clearly India has tried to link Balochistan with Kashmir where it claims Pakistan is still retaining its jihadi option. Islamabads reluctance to relate its Balochistan policy to its overall regional foreign policy will therefore postpone any quick end to the insurgency. Every move it makes in the region whether in the east or the west is matched by counter-moves by its regional neighbours in the light of Pakistans own conduct in the decade of the 1990s. Everyone may be moved by fear and lack of trust rather than any real strategic projection, but the net result is that Balochistan continues to be the cockpit of insurgency, threatening Pakistans grand but still partially contradictory plan to become an energy and trade corridor for the region. http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2006\06\21\story_21-6-2006_pg3_1

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EDITORIAL: Balochistan policy


Thursday, June 8, 2006

SIX months after the initiation of military operations in Balochistan, euphemistically described as raids against lawless elements, the law and order situation remains out of governments control. Scores of civilians and security men have died meanwhile and there is no end in sight to bloodletting. On Tuesday, Sui plant had to be closed when the main pipeline feeding the plant was blown up, affecting gas supply to many industrial units, including fertiliser plants all over the country. This has happened despite a fairly large presence of the law enforcing agencies in the area which underlines the fact that with sections of population being hostile, it is not possible to ensure the security of the pipelines, both existing and those being envisioned for the future. Three rockets were also fired at an FC checkpost in Bolan and a man killed in the Panjgur area when a bomb exploded. That the policy of improving the situation by recourse to military force has failed is now being admitted by important members of the ruling party in Balochistan and its allies. Provincial Assembly Deputy Speaker Aslam Bhootani who belongs to the PML has called upon Islamabad to desist from the use of force and instead take recourse to negotiations. Earlier the MMA, a coalition partner in Balochistan, had called on the government to call a halt to military action in the province. Differing with those who demand laying down of arms prior to any talks, Mr Bhootani has maintained the three Sardars are major political leaders enjoying public support, and that calling on Nawab Akbar Bugti to surrender displayed ignorance of Baloch tradition. The armed confrontation has continued for almost half a year now with no evidence to suggest that it is likely to end in days to come. Acts of violence have led to the suspension of railway traffic, caused power failures, blocked gas supplies, and inflicted losses worth billions. All nationalist parties in Balochistan, Baloch, Pushtun and Hazara, as well as the much maligned Sardars, have consistently pleaded for talks to resolve the outstanding disputes within the context of the federation. As this was ignored, the leadership is fast passing out of their hands to those of extremists. While the President had promised to end the grievances of the smaller provinces, the policies being pursued in Balochistan have in fact multiplied them manifold. Both sides in Balochistan need to display flexibility. Islamabad should announce a change in policy by initiating unconditional talks with the Baloch leadership. Political activists being detained without due process should be released to create goodwill. On their part Baloch leaders should undertake to ensure the security of the gas and power installations in the province. All outstanding issues should be resolved through negotiations within the context of a federation. The policy of giving too little too late should be replaced with one based on timely and effective redressal of grievances without any side making their erstwhile stands a matter of personal prestige. http://www.nation.com.pk/daily/june-2006/8/editorials1.php

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International Comments on Pakistan Military Operation against Secular and Democratic People of Balochistan

Pakistan's Other War,

TIMES REPORT Jun 2006.

Pakistan's battle over Balochistan; (BBC) In Remote Pakistan Province a Civil War Festers (New York Times)
1. Pakistan's Costly 'Other War'By Selig S. Harrison (Washington Post) 2. The War in Pakistan Editorial by WP (Washington Post)

Pakistan's forgotten war

(CNN)

EUROPEAN UNION STATEMENT ON MILITARY OPERATION

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Asia

Pakistan's Other War


Islamabad is already battling al-Qaeda. Now it's facing an insurgency in Baluchistan
BY TIM MCGIRK | ISLAMABAD

Monday, Jun. 19, 2006 He's 80 years old, but Nawab Akbar Khan Bugti, a feudal lord in Pakistan's rugged Baluchistan province, wants to fight to the death. A Kalashnikov rifle strapped to his back, Bugti travels by camel through desert ravines and hobbles up cliffs to hidden caves where he plots ways for his Baluch tribesmen to ambush the Pakistani army. "It's better to dieas the JOHN MOORE / GETTY IMAGES Americans saywith your spurs on," DESERT FOXES: A Baluch guerrilla fires says Bugti. "Instead of a slow death in a rocket at a Pakistani army position bed, I'd rather death come to me while I'm fighting for a purpose." That purpose is to make life as difficult as possible for Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf. Bugti is one of three Baluch tribal chiefs leading an armed uprising against Islamabad. In recent months the fighting has picked up. Hundreds of civilians have died, as well as nearly 400 government soldiers, and thousands of Baluch have been displaced. The conflict has diverted Musharraf's overstretched troops and U.S.-supplied weaponry away from the fight against alQaeda and the Taliban. Moreover, the President's aides say that he is convinced Bugti and fellow tribal leaders Balach Marri and Ataullah Mengal, whom he labels

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"miscreants and outlaws," want to kill hima rocket attack on Dec. 14 in Baluchistan narrowly missed a public address he was making. The fighting flared immediately after. Musharraf, says an aide, has vowed he will "sort them out." That's not going to be easy. The Baluch, a distinct ethnic group spread over Pakistan, Iran and Afghanistan, are fiercely independent and have been a thorn in Islamabad's side for decades regardless of who is in power. Baluchistan is rich in gas and minerals, yet it is Pakistan's poorest province. The government says it wants to develop the territory to improve the lives of the Baluch and to secure the country's energy needs. But the Baluch say they have been marginalized and do not receive adequate royalties from the central authorities for the extraction of the province's natural resources. Islamabad says the feudal chiefs are pocketing the royalties for themselves. Bugti's clan, numbering about 300,000, was granted access to piped gas from the Sui fields on their land only a few years ago even though the gas had been pumping for decades and had already been flowing to major cities and towns. The government is also building a multimillion-dollar port, Gwadar, off Baluchistan's southern coast, which Musharraf hopes will one day rival Dubai in the nearby Gulf. The Baluch fear, however, that Gwadar will draw so many settlers from Pakistan's other provinces that they will become an underclass minority in their own land. So the Baluch clans have gone on the offensive. They are sabotaging railways, blowing up gas pipelines and electricity cables, and attacking soldiers both in their garrisons and while they are on patrol on Baluchistan's desert roads. A mysterious group calling itself the Baluchistan Liberation Army has also sprung up. Bugti and the other tribal leaders say they have no link to the B.L.A., but Islamabad says the group is a creation of the feudal chieftains and that the insurgency is backed by Indiaan allegation New Delhi denies. B.L.A. snipers use World War II-vintage Lee-Enfield rifles to pick off soldiers whenever the Pakistanis leave their camps. On May 11 five bombs exploded in a police training camp outside Baluchistan's provincial capital Quetta, killing six policemen and injuring 13. No one claimed responsibility, but officials blamed the B.L.A. for the attacks. The fighting often stops the flow of gas to Pakistani cities and towns, and it has halted exploration for minerals. If the conflict persists, it could jeopardize Gwadar's future as well as a proposed oil pipeline from Iran to Pakistan, which would pass through Baluchistan. "Right now it's a lowintensity insurgency," says a Western diplomat, "but it could get very nasty." Bugti symbolizes Baluchistan's character. He says he killed his first man when he was just 12, and his life ever since has been a series of unending blood feuds with other clans and with the Pakistani military. Bugti sees himself as a warrior fighting a noble cause. He is self-taught and an avid readeruntil March, the library in his rambling, earthen castle was lined with hundreds of books on philosophy, Western and oriental religions and the European classics. Then the castle, and the library with it, were destroyed by army cannon fire. Bugti is a vegetarian, a rarity among the meatchomping Baluch, and sups every night on a bowl of green chili peppers, according to a frequent guest. He once served as a federal cabinet ministerand later spent years in jail for insurrection. His band of men move between mountain hideouts, sleeping in caves. Bugti says he uses "a rock for my pillow." Reached through a satellite phone by Time in his mountain lair, Bugti spoke of how he deals with pain (he is partially paralyzed in one leg), temperatures of 45C, and the perils of waging a guerrilla war against 26,000 Pakistani soldiers in Baluchistan: "Physical hardshippain, the

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extreme heatthis is all a state of mind. You either give into it or not. And I choose not to." The conflict in Baluchistan has consequences beyond its desert wastes. Pakistan is one of Washington's bulwarks in the war on terror, and receives around $600 million a year in U.S. military aid. According to Baluch rebel sources in Quetta and military sources in Islamabad, U.S. helicopters supplied to Pakistan for hunting members of al-Qaeda have been redirected to Baluchistan's deserts to fight Bugti and his two comrades-in-arms. Three Cessna aircraft, outfitted with sophisticated surveillance equipment and given to Pakistan last year by the U.S. to help catch heroin smugglers, have also been drafted into service against the Baluch rebels. Quetta military base sources say that when U.S. antinarcotics agents examined the Cessnas' flight records last month, they found that only seven hours were spent chasing drug runners, while most of the flying time was logged over Bugti's craggy domain scanning for rebel camps. The U.S. military partnership with Pakistan was designed principally to take the fight to al-Qaeda and those members of the Taliban who have fled across the Afghan border. But a Pakistani military official in Islamabad says the Bush Administration is "fully in the know" that U.S. weaponry is also being used against the Baluch insurgency. "This is all part of a bigger battle against troublemakers challenging the state," says the official. A U.S. State Department official told Time that there's nothing in the agreement with Pakistan to prevent Musharraf using U.S. military aid against Baluch insurgents. "When we transfer the equipment for them, it's for internal security and self-defense," the official says. "There's no 'for al-Qaeda use only' tag on it." Unlike the Taliban and al-Qaeda operating further north along the mountainous Afghan border region, however, the Baluch are not Islamist militants. "They are secular and anti-Taliban," says Samina Ahmed of the International Crisis Group, "yet American guns are being used against them." (Bugti says he's an agnostic, and some clan leaders espouse socialist values and enjoy whisky.) Baluch sources say that U.S. surveillance aircraft and Cobra gunships have targeted tribesmen. The State Department official says, "We've seen no evidence that our equipment has been used to violate human rights." The fighting is taking an increasing toll on civilians, say Baluch sources and independent observers. Ali Dayan Hasan, South Asia researcher for the New York City-based Human Rights Watch, says that "scores of people have disappeared." Musharraf's forces, he says, are carrying out "a policy of abduction, illegal confinement and torture." The Human Rights Commission of Pakistan has documented claims that after a truck hit a land mine on Jan. 11, killing three Frontier Constabulary guards, government security forces went on a rampage executing 12 civilians. Two tribal elders sent to recover the bodies were also shot, says the Human Rights Commission. Pakistani army officials deny that soldiers have engaged in abuse or indiscriminate killing. A Pakistani military commander in Baluchistan told Time that "the reason we are not going for a massive, one-to-end-it-all strike is the fear of collateral damage." Pakistani officials say that Bugti and the others are desert relics, feudal lords willing to sacrifice their men in battle and delay progress, just to retain their power. Bugti says that a deeper issue of autonomy as at issue. "We Baluch believe that the best way to die is to die fighting," says Bugti. "Are we Baluch the masters of our own destiny? Because if that's taken away from us, then life doesn't really matter."

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http://www.time.com/time/asia/magazine/article/0,13673,501060626-12054111,00.html
With reporting by Ghulam Hasnain/Dera Murad Jamali, Syed Talat Hussain/Islamabad and Elaine Shannon/Washington

Pakistan's Costly 'Other War'


By Selig S. Harrison

Wednesday, February 15, 2006; Page A21 WASHINGTON POST The usual explanation for Pakistan's failure to go all-out against al Qaeda and Taliban forces along the Afghan frontier is that Gen. Pervez Musharraf's armed forces and intelligence services are riddled with Islamic extremists. But there is also another, equally disturbing, reason. Musharraf has increasingly been forced to divert ground forces and U.S.-supplied air power from the Afghan front and from Kashmir earthquake relief efforts to combat a bitter, little-noticed insurgency in his strategic southern coastal province of Baluchistan. Musharraf's "other war" against the Baluch, an ethnic minority of 4.5 million, has become increasingly bloody in recent weeks. According to U.S. intelligence sources, six Pakistani army brigades, plus paramilitary forces totaling some 25,000 men, are battling Baluch Liberation Army guerrillas in the Kohlu mountains and surrounding areas. The independent Pakistan Human Rights Commission has reported "indiscriminate bombing and strafing" by 20 U.S.-supplied Cobra helicopter gunships and four squadrons of fighter planes, including U.S.-supplied F-16 fighter jets, resulting in 215 civilian dead and hundreds more wounded, many of them women and children. Visiting U.S. Undersecretary of State Nicholas Burns told human rights commission leaders recently that the Baluch conflict is an "internal matter" for Pakistan to resolve and that the United States has not raised the issue with Musharraf. This policy should be reversed, not only to stop the carnage but also because the United States has a major strategic stake in a peaceful accommodation between Islamabad and Baluch leaders. The administration should call on Musharraf to start negotiations immediately, and President Bush should keep up the pressure when he visits Islamabad in March. Multiethnic Pakistan, dominated by the Punjabis, who control the army, is likely to become increasingly ungovernable in the absence of a political settlement with the Baluch. A continued military confrontation in Baluchistan could well intensify longfestering ethnic unrest in neighboring Sind and embolden various anti-Musharraf

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forces throughout Pakistan. Musharraf's ability to put adequate military resources into the fight against al Qaeda and the Taliban, already limited, would be further reduced, undermining U.S. efforts to stabilize Afghanistan. The strategic importance of Baluchistan has grown since China started building a port for Pakistan at the Baluch port of Gwadar, close to the Strait of Hormuz, with a projected 27 berths, enough for a major Pakistani naval base that could be used by Beijing. The Baluch ancestral homeland stretches west beyond Gwadar into adjacent Baluch-majority areas of eastern Iran, where there is a nascent Baluch rebellion against President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Iran fears Baluch nationalism, but India is more ambivalent. New Delhi wants a stable Pakistan that will negotiate a peace settlement on Kashmir. At the same time, many Indian commentators appear happy to see Musharraf bogged down in Baluchistan and hope that the Baluch crisis will force him to ratchet down Pakistani support for Kashmiri Islamic extremist insurgents. Musharraf has presented no evidence to back up his accusations that India is aiding the Baluch insurgents. But New Delhi did say on Dec. 27 that it is "watching with concern the spiraling military violence in Baluchistan" and called for political dialogue. Both Baluch and Sindhi leaders have often said that they would welcome Indian intervention to liberate them from Islamabad. At present, most Baluch leaders do not call for independence. They are ready to settle for the provincial autonomy envisaged in the 1973 Pakistani constitution, which successive military regimes, including the present one, have nullified. What the Baluch, Sindhis and a third, more assimilated ethnic minority, the Pushtuns, want above all is an end to blatant economic discrimination by the dominant Punjabis. Most of Pakistan's natural resources are in Baluchistan, including natural gas, uranium, copper and potentially rich oil reserves, both onshore and offshore. Although 36 percent of the gas produced in Pakistan comes from the province, Baluchistan consumes only a fraction of its production because it is the most impoverished area of Pakistan. For decades, Punjabi-dominated central governments have denied Baluchistan a fair share of development funds and paid only 12 percent of the royalties due to the province for the gas produced there. The Baluch were forcibly incorporated into Pakistan when it was created in 1947 and have subsequently staged two short-lived rebellions, in 1958 and 1962, as well as a protracted struggle from 1973 to 1977 that involved some 80,000 Pakistani troops and 55,000 Baluch tribesmen. The big difference between earlier phases of the Baluch struggle and the present one is that Islamabad is no longer able to play off feuding tribes against each other and faces a unified nationalist movement. Another important difference is that the Baluch have a better-armed, more disciplined fighting force. Baluch leaders say that rich compatriots in the Persian Gulf are providing the money needed to buy weapons in the flourishing black market. It is clear that a continuing Baluch insurgency would pose a major threat to the Musharraf regime and to U.S. interests in Pakistan. Future military and economic aid

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to Islamabad should clearly be withheld until Musharraf stops his military repression in Baluchistan and enters into serious negotiations with Baluch leaders. Once the present crisis is defused, the United States should launch a sustained effort to promote a process of democratization in Pakistan that gives long-overdue recognition to its multiethnic character. The writer, former South Asia bureau chief of The Post, is the author of "In Afghanistan's Shadow," a study of Baluch nationalism. He is director of the Asia Program at the Center for International Policy. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wpdyn/content/article/2006/02/14/AR2006021401767.html

The War in Pakistan


Wednesday, January 25, 2006; Page A18 SHORTLY AFTER Sept. 11, 2001, President Bush famously declared that other countries must choose between supporting the United States and supporting terrorism, and that those that harbored al Qaeda would be treated as the enemy. In the years since, he has refrained from applying that tough principle in practice -- which is lucky for Pakistan's president, Gen. Pervez Musharraf. Ever since the war on terrorism began, this meretricious military ruler has tried to be counted as a U.S. ally while avoiding an all-out campaign against the Islamic extremists in his country, who almost surely include Osama bin Laden and his top deputies. Despite mounting costs in American lives and resources, he has gotten away with it. Gen. Musharraf and his aides, such as Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz, boast that Pakistan has arrested hundreds of al Qaeda militants and deployed tens of thousands of troops in the border region near Afghanistan. Yet Gen. Musharraf has never directed his forces against the Pashtun Taliban militants who use Pakistan as a base to wage war against American and Afghan forces across the border. He has never dismantled the Islamic extremist groups that carry out terrorist attacks against India. He has never cleaned up the Islamic madrassas that serve as a breeding ground for suicide bombers. He has pardoned and protected the greatest criminal proliferator of nuclear weapons technology in history, A.Q. Khan, who aided Libya, North Korea and Iran. And he has broken promises to give up his military office or return Pakistan to democracy. The consequences of this record are that al Qaeda has continued to operate from Pakistan, while U.S. and allied troops have been unable to pacify southern Afghanistan. More than 125 American soldiers have been killed there in the past year,

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many of them by militants crossing the border. Osama bin Laden is apparently secure enough to have released an audiotape last week threatening more attacks inside the United States. The Bush administration is still providing Gen. Musharraf $600 million in annual military and economic aid and treating him as a major ally. But in the absence of effective Pakistani action, it has also stepped up its own clandestine operations in the border areas where al Qaeda and its allies are based. At least three times in the past year, drone aircraft armed with missiles have attacked terrorist targets; most recently, a strike on a Pakistani village this month killed at least 13 people, several important al Qaeda operatives possibly among them. In keeping with his double game, Gen. Musharraf's government publicly criticized the latest attack even though his intelligence service reportedly cooperated with it. Now he and Mr. Aziz, who met with Mr. Bush yesterday, are saying U.S. forces should carry out no more such attacks without Pakistani agreement. We'll assume that's more of their bluster. Even if it is not, Mr. Bush should ignore it. Gen. Musharraf perhaps cannot be forced to side decisively with the United States against the terrorists, as the administration once hoped -- though much more could be done to raise the price of his feckless cooperation. But Mr. Bush must take every available measure to eliminate the al Qaeda and Taliban operations in Pakistan. If targets can be located, they should be attacked -- with or without Gen. Musharraf's cooperation.

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In Remote Pakistan Province (Balochistan), a Civil War Festers


By CARLOTTA GALL Published: April 2, 2006 DERA BUGTI, Pakistan Explosions at gas pipelines and railroad tracks are common in this remote desert region. Now, roadside bombs and artillery shells are, too. More than 100 civilians have been killed in recent months, along with dozens of government security forces, local residents and Pakistan's Human Rights Commission say. The rebels say the government wants the region's oil and gas reserves but is neglecting its economic development. More Photos

Pakistan's Second Front

Scott Eells for The New York Times Nawab Akbar Khan Bugti, a tribal leader in the impoverished Baluchistan region of Pakistan, travels by camel with his band of guerrilla fighters. More Photos > This is the other front of Pakistan's widening civil unrest, not the tribal areas along the Afghan border where the United States would like the government to press a campaign against Islamic militants, but the restive province of Baluchistan, home to an intensifying insurgency. It is here, say local leaders and opposition politicians, that Pakistan, an important ally in the United States' campaign against terrorism, has diverted troops from the fight

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against Al Qaeda and the Taliban to settle old scores as it seeks to develop the region's valuable oil and gas reserves. One visit makes it clear that, despite official denials, the government is waging a fullscale military campaign here. Rebel leaders say they have several thousand men under arms, fighting what they estimate are 23,000 Pakistani troops. During a 24-hour trek on camel, horse and foot across the rugged, stony terrain in early March, the fighting was plain to see. Military jets and surveillance planes flew over the area, and long-range artillery lighted up the distant night sky. This fight is altogether separate from the Taliban insurgency on Afghanistan's border or the Shiite-Sunni violence that sporadically flares in and around the provincial capital, Quetta, and it threatens to dwarf the nation's other conflicts. It is about the ethnic rights and self-rule of the Baluch people, who are distinct among Pakistanis. They speak their own language, Baluchi, which has its roots in Persian, and are probably the oldest settlers in the region. In particular, tensions have been aggravated by President Pervez Musharraf's determination to develop the area's oil and gas fields, the largest in the country, as well as his aim to build a pipeline across the region to carry oil from Iran and a strategic deep sea port to expand trade with China, local residents say. They charge that General Musharraf has shown little regard for their concerns and that for years their province has received paltry royalties on its resources, while remaining one of the country's poorest regions. The government has branded two of the rebel leaders, Nawab Akbar Khan Bugti, nearly 80, and Balach Marri, 40, "miscreants," outlaws who oppose economic development to retain a hold over their tribes. In an interview under the shade of a rocky overhang, Mr. Bugti and Mr. Marri, who share the names of the tribes they lead, dismissed the charges. They are not opposed to economic development, they said, but rather to the Pakistani government's military campaign to suppress them. "The military government has imposed military rule and this has forced the Baluch to defend their land and resources against the might of the armed forces of Pakistan

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assembled in our area," Mr. Bugti said, perched in a carved wooden armchair as tribesmen sat around him cradling Kalashnikov rifles. "The dispute is about the national rights of the Baluch," he added, "and if the government accepted these rights then there would be no dispute." Mr. Bugti and others said that the government was using its American-supplied jets and helicopter gunships against them. They said they had found bomb fragments with "Made in U.S.A." stamped on them. Indeed, huge craters and fragments from American-designed MK-82 bombs lay beside a badly damaged school in the village of Mararar, the results of a bombing raid that the Baluch fighters said had occurred at the beginning of March. Another bombing raid on or around March 14 hit two bulldozers building a road, the fighters said. A collection of bomb fragments gathered by tribesmen from other raids revealed a "valve solenoid" made in New York, and part of a gas generator made in Mesa, Ariz. Last year, the Baluch political leaders presented a 15-point agenda to the central government. The demands included greater control of the province's resources, protection for the Baluch minority and a halt to the building of military bases that local residents say have proliferated here. Concern over the issues had been building for years, said Suret Khan Marri, a historian living in Quetta, the provincial capital, and the concerns and violence reach far beyond the Bugti and Marri tribes. "The movement is there," he said in an interview. "Sometimes it is crushed. Now it is the fifth insurgency, and it has spread all across the Baluch area." Armed resistance by Baluch nationalists has been a repeating occurrence since the birth of Pakistan in 1947, when tribal leaders, Mr. Bugti among them, only grudgingly joined Pakistan after having ruled independent territories under the British. The bitterness today is such that the tribal leaders compare the situation to the 1970's, when Bangladesh broke from Pakistan. "If grievances have come to this level that we do not mind if Pakistan disintegrates then things are bad," Mr. Marri, the rebel leader, said.

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The terrain here is marked by harsh, rocky desert, rising into craggy mountains and cut through with narrow gorges that supply many hiding places for shepherds, or guerrilla fighters. In the summer, temperatures soar to more than 120 degrees. The shadowy Baluchistan Liberation Army, one of three armed resistance groups born in the 1970's, has claimed responsibility for many of the recent attacks, including the killing of three Chinese engineers working on the deep sea port, at Gwadar. Mr. Marri said that he did not know who was leading the group, but that it was neither a Bugti nor a Marri. The most recent violence has included summary killings of settlers from the Punjab, whom Baluch nationalists blame for stealing jobs and land. Hundreds of political party members, students, doctors and tribal leaders have been detained by government security forces, many disappearing for months, even years, without trials in well-documented cases. Some have been tortured or have died in custody, say officials of Pakistan's Human Rights Commission. A Baluch doctor, Bari Langove, 36, said he had examined a student leader, Dr. Allah Nasar Baloch, in a prison ward in Quetta six months ago and found him so debilitated that he could neither walk nor talk at first. "He was mentally exhausted and wholly unable to speak," Dr. Langove said in an interview in Quetta. "We examined him and found he had post-traumatic stress disorder, symptoms of loss of short-term memory, insomnia, loss of appetite and energy." In places like Dera Bugti and Kohlu, government forces have carried out reprisals against villagers, Baluch leaders and human rights officials say. In a case documented by the Human Rights Commission, the Frontier Corps, a paramilitary force commanded by army officers, killed 12 men from Pattar Nala on Jan. 11 after a mine explosion near the village killed some of its soldiers. Two old men from the village who went to the base to collect the bodies were also killed. The next day, the 14 bodies were handed over to the women of the village. Local fighters say the Frontier Corps has carried out 42 such reprisal killings in the last three months, the latest involving six villagers during the week of March 6. The government offensive began after a rocket attack on President Musharraf as opened a military base in Kohlu on Dec. 17 an attack for which officials blamed Marri rebels, and Mr. Marri in particular.

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Shortly afterward, government forces stormed the town of Dera Bugti, Mr. Bugti said, adding that they were burning shops and houses there still, including his family home. The government has played down the fighting, and denies that the Pakistani Army is even deployed in Baluchistan, saying that it is merely using the Frontier Corps to run a police operation to stem violence. In interviews, the police chief, Chaudhry Muhammad Yakub, put the number of rebels at no more than 1,000. The provincial governor Owais Ahmed Ghani, said 36,000 Frontier Corps soldiers were deployed in Baluchistan, with two-thirds concentrated along the Afghan border. Both predicted that the Baluchistan conflict would be over within two months. In all this, Mr. Bugti is an unexpected participant. He has been a prominent player in regional politics for many years and was governor of Baluchistan. He has spent time in detention on charges of murder during a long and colorful life. Educated under the British Raj, he is a man from a bygone era, who said he attended the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II in London in 1953. Now, forced to flee his home, he lives an austere life, camping out under the stars with his loyal tribesmen, a Kalashnikov propped by his aluminum walking stick. "I have had a good and full life," he said, unperturbed. "It is better to die quickly in the mountains than slowly in your bed." He warned that the government would be foolish not to negotiate with the senior tribal leaders. "If we are removed from the scene, I can guarantee the government will have a heck of a time from the younger generation, because they are more extreme," he said. One of his grandsons, Brahamdagh, 25, is commanding the Bugti resistance fighters, and he appeared silently every so often to brief his grandfather. He took to the mountains in 2002 with just 50 to 60 men. Brahamdagh contended that he now had more than 2,000 fighters in Dera Bugti and thousands more civilian helpers. He said the Marris had roughly the same number in Kohlu. In addition, small cells of fighters are in every district of the province, he said.

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"There are so many groups," he said. "Three to four guys get together and decide what to do, to hit a railway or a bus. We are showing our bitterness. We are fighting the government to show we are not happy with you and you should leave our homeland." Mr. Marri, who arrived unannounced one afternoon, on foot and accompanied by a dozen armed fighters, is another of the younger generation. The third son of the leader of the Marri tribe, he has spent most of his life outside Pakistan. In 2002, he returned to run for Parliament but spent most of his time in his home in Kohlu, the capital of the Kohlu district, until forced to flee by the government offensive. "If they think they can pressure us like this, then they don' t know us," he warned. "The Baluch people have woken up." The Human Rights Commission and opposition political parties have urged both sides to seek a political solution to the conflict. Yet at the moment there is no dialogue. Two parliamentary committees set up last year to look into Baluch grievances have stalled, and General Musharraf has been blunt in his determination to use force against anyone opposing his vision for the region. In their mountain stronghold, Mr. Bugti and Mr. Marri, and a third leader, Ataullah Mengal, in his home in Karachi, are disparaging about talks with the government. "They are not worth sitting with at the table," Mr. Marri said. "The general keeps offering peanuts when my rights are at stake. We are not against negotiations, but only negotiations that are worthwhile." Mr. Bugti offered his own grim prognosis. "I don' t see it ending," he said.

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Last Updated: Friday, 27 January 2006, 13:56 GMT

Pakistan's battle over Balochistan


By Zaffar Abbas BBC News, Islamabad

Nawab Akbar Bugti sits in a cave in Balochistan, guarded by his poorly-attired, heavily-armed tribesmen. With anti-personnel mines encircling his mountain hideout, the octogenarian warrior mixes 17th century guerrilla tactics with modern weaponry to take on the might of Pakistan's security forces. Near the hideout of the Bugti tribe, another chieftain, Nawab Khair The heavily-guarded Baksh, fights a similar battle with hideout of Nawab Akbar security forces in the district of Bugti Kohlu. Kohlu was the scene of a rocket attack last month that coincided with President Pervez Musharraf's visit to the area. Since the attack, an estimated 100 people have died, accelerating a two-year old conflict in which Baloch militants have targeted railway tracks, power facilities and other key installations. No matter what the authorities say about foreign involvement, seasoned Balochistan watchers say the

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Pakistan's human rights local commission has detailed widespread violations by the security forces, including extra-judicial killings - a report government officials say is one-sided. No-one seems to know exactly how many civilians have died in helicopter raids on suspected militant camps or in the numerous rocket attacks on soldiers' camps. In the words of one analyst, it's an undeclared war in which neither side is observing the rules. New significance So what on earth is going on in Balochistan, which is regarded as the poorest and most backward of Pakistan's four provinces? With about six million inhabitants, Pakistan's biggest province has less than half the population of the port city of Karachi. In mineral resources, however, it is said to be the richest province and is a major supplier of natural gas to the country. With the government now planning to construct a deep sea port at Gwadar and a road link with Afghanistan and central Asia, Balochistan has acquired a new significance - both for Pakistan and other regional players. And that is where the problem lies. Nationalist anger For decades, Baloch nationalists have been critical of the central government in Islamabad, accusing it of depriving the province its due. They say the government took away income from natural gas and other resources, while spending only a trivial amount on the province. The struggle for greater national rights, financial resources and against the establishment of military camps in Balochistan has now led to a tacit understanding between Nawab Bugti and Nawab Baksh. One of Mr Baksh's six sons leads a force of trained and semi-

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trained Marri tribesmen, which goes by the name of the Balochistan Liberation Army (BLA). A third tribal leader, former Chief Minister Ataullah Mengal, is not involved in the armed struggle but gives it his ideological and political backing. For these nationalist leaders, large projects such as the highway and Gwadar port scheme are another form of subjugation serving the central government but offering little benefit to Balochistan. The military garrisons set up in the area to secure the expected foreign investment are, for people like Nawab Bugti, also part of well-conceived plan to suppress the nationalist voice. 'Foreign involvement' President Musharraf refers to these tribal chiefs as antidevelopment. He says they oppose his projects because they will bring prosperity to the area and will end the archaic tribal system which preserves their power. Without naming any country, he also accuses the armed Baloch militants of playing into foreign hands. Senior officials in the security forces say they grew alarmed when intelligence agencies found more than one foreign country was involved in the province's affairs. The countries were said to be opposed to Gwadar becoming a Balochistan has a long major trading port for central Asian history of resisting nations and China. external influences One official said the biggest shock came when the interrogation of a group of militants revealed they had been trained in a friendly Gulf country, which allegedly feared it could lose its status as the region's biggest trading port. But no matter what the authorities say about foreign involvement, seasoned Balochistan watchers say the problem is essentially local. They say the Baloch people can only be tamed through political means, pointing out that this is not the first time they have taken up arms to fight those they see as outsiders.

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And, they say, though the might of the armed forces might crush the people of Balochistan, it will never win their hearts and minds. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/4652882.stm

Pakistan's forgotten war


Baluchistan struggles for independence from Islamabad
Wednesday, May 24, 2006 Posted: 0322 GMT (1122 HKT

Baluch rebel tribesmen stand at their post in Dera Bugti near Quetta.

QUETTA, Pakistan (AP) -- In the remote desert of Baluchistan, a war for independence is distracting Pakistan as it struggles to contain Taliban and al Qaeda militants along the Afghan border. It is up against an array of Baluch fighters who accuse it of plundering the hidden riches of the arid southwestern province: natural gas. It's Pakistan's "other" war, a sideshow to its battle in troubled Waziristan some 250 miles (400 kilometers) to the north, where pro-Taliban fighters have gained stature and Osama bin Laden is still suspected to be hiding. But the conflict in Baluchistan is also a costly one, feeding off the deprivation in what is Pakistan's largest and poorest province despite sitting on the nation's principal gas reserves. The army put down another tribal rebellion here in 1974, reportedly leaving about 3,000 dead.

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"It's not just a few tribal chiefs against the government. There's a genuine movement of Baluch nationalists. There are people enlisting every day and picking up arms," said Asma Jehangir, chairwoman of the independent Human Rights Commission of Pakistan. Violence escalated sharply after rockets landed about 300 meters from President Gen. Pervez Musharraf while he was visiting the town of Kohlu in December. The Pakistanis then launched an offensive against the Bugti and Marri tribes, whose leaders control swaths of Baluchistan like feudal lords with militias numbering thousands. People in Baluchistan feel shortchanged. The royalties on their gas have barely changed since 1952. Only 25 percent of villages are electrified, and only 20 percent have safe drinking water. The shadowy and recently outlawed Baluchistan Liberation Army is blamed for neardaily attacks on gas pipelines and electricity pylons that have disrupted the province's power supply. It claimed responsibility for bombings at a police training school at the provincial capital Quetta on May 11 that killed seven people. 'Indiscriminate bombing' Musharraf says he wants to develop Baluchistan. He is building a deep sea port at its coast and encouraging foreign investment. But new military garrisons intended to secure the restive region have bred suspicion and hardened resistance. "The government wants to take complete control of the gas fields for future digging and drilling. Their policy is to exterminate the Baluch," said Nawab Akbar Bugti, 79, the silver-bearded Bugti chief, speaking to The Associated Press by satellite phone from his mountain hideout. He said thousands of soldiers and paramilitaries had been deployed, using helicopter gunships, bombs and artillery. He claimed hundreds of civilians had been killed and tens of thousands displaced from around Dera Bugti, some 300 kilometers (200 miles) southeast of Quetta. In a report on two recent fact-finding missions to Baluchistan, the rights commission accused the military of "indiscriminate bombing" and listed more than 60 dead in December and January, many of them women and children. It also voiced "grave concern" over militants mining roads. The government denies killing civilians and presents the problem as one of law and order. Raziq Bugti, a spokesman for the elected Baluchistan provincial government, said that if militias disbanded, gave up heavy weapons and stopped challenging Pakistan's sovereignty, negotiations would be possible. If not, "force will be used. It's very clear," he said.

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The Baluch make up about half of the province's 6.5 million people. They have coexisted with ethnic Pashtuns, Sindhis and Punjabis but long-brewing tensions are increasingly coming to the surface. "Punjabis should leave," said Asif Baluch of the Baluch Students' Organization, which advocates independence for the Baluch. "We're not against them as human beings, but as a dominant class." He accused intelligence agencies of holding Baluch activists for months, sometimes years, without trial. Baluch separatists have started targeting ethnic Punjabis who dominate Pakistan's bureaucracy and security services. On March 18, at a mountain picnic spot southeast of Quetta, masked men shot dead two junior government officials they believed to be Punjabis. A third survived his gunshot wounds by playing dead. Faruq Shah, a Pashtun, was spared after the attackers twice checked his ID. "It feels like I escaped from the jaws of death," he said.
http://edition.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/asiapcf/05/23/pakistan.baluch.ap/

Copyright 2006 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

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EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT

2004

2009

European Parliament Vice President Opposes the Killing in Balochistan Brussels, BE, Belgium, -- Mr. Janusz Onyszkiewicz Vice President European Parliament and 66 other Members of the European Parliament jointly submitted a petition to President Josep Borell, President European Parliament urging him to impress upon the Government of Pakistan to stop the killing of Innocent Women and Children in Pakistan's Balochistan Province. The people of Balochistan, a province located along the borders of Pakistan with Iran and Afghanistan , are being subjected to an armed onslaught by Pakistan's armed forces , when they have only sought to articulate their grievances and seek their just rights . The Baloch have long protested that while the rest of Pakistan has prospered through the exploitation of their province's resources by the Government of Pakistan, Balochistan itself remains the most backward province in Pakistan devoid of development or adequate employment opportunities. The Baloch fear that the policies of the present government, like the Government's of the past, appear geared to changing the demographics of the province; turning the Baloch into a minority in their own homeland; and exploiting their resources for the benefit of a dominant Punjab. The unwarranted military action by Pakistan's armed forces, has spared neither women nor children resulting in widespread human rights violations. The situation has been exacerbated by the attempts of the military government of General Pervez Musharraf , to tarnish the image of the Baloch leaders; indulge in manipulations to pit tribe against tribe and clan against clan; and rubbish the genuine grievances of the people ; while refusing to deal honestly with the deprivation of the province. The media and NGOs have not been allowed free and unfettered access to the areas targeted by Pakistan's forces making it impossible for the world community to acquaint itself with the real picture of the horrendous situation in the province. In the petition the Members of the European Parliament have requested that the economic and political rights of the population of Balochistan must be respected by Pakistan. The MEPs have called for the appointment of a special rapporteur on Balochistan; the closing down of the irregular detention camps; free access for the media and representatives of civil society including access to jails ; and guaranteed freedom to the Red Cross to operate freely in the region. Mr. Onyszkiwiez also mentioned in a press conference that he and his colleagues will be organizing a conference on the Current Situation in Balochistan which will interalia have several victims of violence in Balochistan province speaking about their experiences. 24-03-2006.
For more information, Please contact: Maria WPC PR, World Peace Council 3227083555, 0

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PAKISTAN: THE RESURGENCE OF BALOCH NATIONALISM


Frdric Grare
Thirty years after a bloody conflict, which, according to official sources, caused more than 5,000 deaths among the rebels and almost 3,000 among the Pakistani Army, Baluchistan seems to be heading towards another armed insurrection. In the summer of 2004, there were numerous attacks against the army and the paramilitary forces as well as repeated sabotage of oil pipelines. Then, following the rape of a lady doctor by a group of soldiers on January 2 in the hospital in Sui, the principal gasproduction centre in Baluchistan, assaults have multiplied, culminating in a pitched battle between the Frontier Corps, a paramilitary unit, and the local Bugtis, one of the largest Baluch tribes. According to the Pakistani daily, The Nation, about 1568 terrorist attacks occurred through April 3. These attacks have not been confined only to tribal areas, but have targeted Pakistani armed forces or Chinese nationals working on major regional projects all over the province. Longstanding resentments caused armed conflict in 1948, 1958 and 1973. Today, these resentments persist over the federal governments suppression of nationalistic aspirations, the absence of economic and social development in Baluchistan despite its possessing almost 20% of the countrys mineral and energy resources, and the exclusion of the provincial authorities and local population from decisions on major regional projects, most notably, the construction of the Gwadar port. Non-Baluchis have also won major jobs and contracts from the armed forces, and have benefited from land speculation. Whether because of or in spite of its strategic interests in Baluchistan, the Pakistani government has not integrated the province into the state. As a matter of fact, the Baluchis believes today that Baluchistan is a colony of Punjab, the most populated and powerful province of Pakistan. Balochistan today stands at the crossroads of three linked although non identical issues: the national question, the role of the army and the use of Islamism. The national question is obviously central. 58 years after independence, the four provinces of Pakistan still reflect ethnic divisions that the central government neither fully accommodates nor can eliminate. The elite, in particular the army elite, has never recognized ethnic identities. From Ayub Khan to Pervaiz Musharraf, it has always tried to promote a united Pakistan. Former dictator Zia-ul-Haq was quoted as saying that he would ideally like to break up the existing provinces and replace them with fifty three small provinces, erasing ethnic identities from the map of Pakistan

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altogether.1 To achieve unity, the army rule of the country has almost always favored military solutions over political ones and tended to reinforce separatist tendencies. Cognizant of their provinces strategic and economic importance, Baluchis have been all more resentful of the militarys arrogance and contempt. Finally, this army exercises its power by manipulating Islam to weaken Baluch nationalism and, what is even more important, to conceal the real nature of the Baluch problem from the outside world. The Baluch crisis is not just the unintended outcome of more or less appropriate decisions. It epitomizes the armys mode of governance and its relation with Pakistans citizens and world public opinion. Why Balochistan Matters Baluchistan, which straddles three countries (Pakistan, Iran and Afghanistan) and borders the Arabian Sea, is a vast and sparsely populated province (with 6,511 million people2 occupying 43% of Pakistans territory), that contains within its borders all the contradictions that affect the region, including conflict between the United States and the Taliban. A large part of the American military operations in Afghanistan are launched from the Pasni and Dalbandin bases situated on Baluchi territory.3 The Taliban, backed by both Pakistan and Iran, also operate out of here. If the pressure on Western forces in Afghanistan were to become unbearable, Washington and its allies could conceivably use the Baluchi nationalists, who are fiercely anti-mullah and opposed to the Taliban, to exert diplomatic pressure on Islamabad as well as Teheran. Further, although it is the most sparsely populated province of Pakistan, (about 4% of the present population)4, Baluchistan is economically and strategically important. The subsoil holds a substantial portion on Pakistans energy and mineral resources, accounting for 36% of its total gas production. It also holds large quantities of coal, gold, copper, silver, platinum, aluminium, and, above all, uranium and is a potential transit zone for a pipeline transporting Iranian and Turkmenian gas to India. The Baluchistan coast is particularly important. It provides Pakistan with an exclusive economic zone potentially rich in oil, gas and minerals spread over approximately 180,000 square kilometres, while giving Baluchistan considerable strategic importance. As a matter of fact, three of Pakistans four naval bases -Ormara, Pasni, and Gwadar are situated on the Baluchistan coast. Located close to the Hormuz Strait, at the entrance to the Persian Gulf, Gwadar is expected to provide a port, warehouses and industrial facilities to more than 20 countries -- including those in the Gulf and on the Red Sea, and in Central Asia and East Africa, as well as Iran, India, and parts of north-west China.5 The first phase of construction having
Harrison Selig, In Afghanistans Shadow: Baluch nationalism and Soviet Temptations, Washington D.C., Carnegie Endowment for International peace, 1981, p. 151. 2 According to the 1998 census. 3 The Jacobabad base is situated in Sind. The United States also have a listening post in Jiwani near the Iranian border. 4 It was 5.1% of the population according to the 1998 census. This shows the relative decline of the Baluch population as compared with the overall Pakistani one. 5 Hamid Hamza Qaisrani, Gwadar port ready for inauguration, in The Gwadar News, April 2005, pp. 2-3.
1

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been completed, the port is now capable of receiving freighters with a capacity of 30,000 tons and container vessels going up to 25,000 tons. The completion of the second phase by 2010 will enable the port to receive oil-tankers having a capacity of almost 200,000 tons. A special industrial development zone and an export zone have also been planned - Gwadar will soon be declared a free trade zone. Finally, to make Pakistan the nerve center of all commercial activity in the region, the government is building a road and rail network linking Gwadar to Afghanistan and Central Asia that will provide these countries with an outlet to the sea. Gwadar port, situated 725 km to the west of Karachi, has been designed to bolster Pakistans strategic defensives by providing an alternative to the Karachi port, which once had to face a long blockade by the Indian Navy. Karcachis vulnerability was confirmed when the threat of another blockade loomed large during the Kargil conflict.6 In fact, the Gwadar project is an integral part of a policy seeking to diversify Pakistans port facilities. The construction of the Ormara base in Baluchistan, which became operational in 2000, is also a part of the same policy.7 Chinas presence further enhances Gwadars importance. In fact, the port was built mainly with Chinese capital and labour. Some consider this isolated township in the south-west of Pakistan as a Chinese naval outpost on the Indian Ocean designed to protect Beijings oil-supply lines from the Middle East and to counter Americas growing presence in Central Asia.8 General Musharraf and Shaukat Aziz, then Finance Minister, are supposed to have insisted that the Chinese government finance the project in exchange for docking facilities in Gwadar and Ormara and for permission to set up a listening post on the Makran coast to intercept the communications of American military bases in the Gulf. Beijing also operates the gold and copper mines in Saindak, near the borders of Afghanistan and Iran, and not far from the Ras Koh Mountains where Pakistans nuclear tests are conducted. Iran, which has a Baluch population of about 1 million, is closely monitoring these developments. Teheran is afraid of Baluchi nationalism and of subversive American actions (supported when the need arises by Islamabad) on its own territory. It is also worried about competition from Pakistan in opening up Central Asia. The Reasons behind the Crisis Todays crisis in Baluchistan was provoked, ironically, by the federal governments attempt to develop this backward area by undertaking a series of big projects. Instead of cheering these projects, the Baluchis, faced with slowing population growth, responded with fear that they would be dispossessed of their land and resources and of their distinct identity. In addition, three fundamental problems are fuelling this crisis: I. Baluchistan has failed to benefit from its own natural gas deposits. The first of these were discovered in Sui in 1953. Gas was supplied to Multan and Rawalpindi, in Punjab, in 1964, but Quetta, the capital of Baluchistan, had to wait till 1986 for its share of the gas. Further, the only reason that the federal government decided to
6 7

Hamid Hamza Qaisrani, op. cit., p. 3. Tarique Niazi, Gwadar: Chinas Naval Outpost on the Indian Ocean, 2 /28/2005, http://www.asianresearch.org/articles/2528.html 8 Ibid

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extend the gas pipeline was because it decided to station a military garrison in the Baluchi capital. In the Dera Bugti district, where conflicts took place recently and which is home to the gas fields of Sui and Pircoh, only the town of Dera Bugti is supplied gas, and it is only supplied because a paramilitary camp was opened there ten years ago. Overall, only four of the 26 districts constituting Baluchistan are supplied with gas. In fact, although it accounts for 36% of Pakistans total gas production, the province consumes only 6%. The remaining 83% is sent to the rest of the country. In addition, the federal government charges a much lower price for Baluchi gas than it does for gas produced in other provinces, particularly Sind and Punjab.9 Moreover, Baluchistan receives no more than 12.4% of the royalties due to it for supplying gas. There is a also the question of what to do about the gas and hydrocarbon reserves lying under the soil of Baluchistan. Baluchistan produces more than 40% of Pakistans primary energy (natural gas, coal and electricity). The government has announced that the gas deposits being exploited at present will be depleted by 2012, leading to the need to drill deeper and undertake fresh exploration. Reports by geological experts indicate the presence of 19 trillion cubic feet of gas and 6 trillion barrels of oil reserves in Baluchistan, but the Baluchis are determined to prevent further exploration and development without their consent. They want an agreement for the equitable sharing of resources.10 II. Baluchis have had very little role in the construction of Gwadar port, which has been entirely under the control of the federal government.11 The project will only benefit the people of Baluchistan if a massive effort is undertaken to train and recruit locals and if the port is linked with the rest of Baluchistan, which is certainly not the case at present. Of the 600 odd persons employed in the construction of the first phase of the project, only 100, essentially daily wage workers, were Baluchis. There has also been only one road, which joins Gwadar to Karachi, opening the port to the rest of the country. Although Gwadar is the regions only deep-water port, there is no well-defined policy to turn it into a free trade zone. No effort has been made to train the local population so that it can be work on the development project. There is not a single technical school or college in Gwadar or in the surrounding area. In addition, the land around the port that was acquired below market price by the Pakistan Navy and Coast Guard and distributed to officers has since been subject to a great deal of financial speculation.12
One unit of gas priced Rs.27 in Baluchistan, costs between Rs.170 and 190 in Sind and Punjab, even though the technical conditions of production do not justify this price difference. 10 In 2001, a Chinese company was given permission by the Pakistani government to prospect and map the area. The Chinese were given express instructions not to talk to the local tribes. The tribes killed two Chinese employees and one Pakistani, and the Chinese company was obliged to leave. Interview with Akbar Bugti, 16 April 2004. 11 No representative of the provincial government was present during the signature of the project agreement by President Musharraf and the Chinese Vice Premier Wu Bannguo on 24 March 2002 in Gwadar. 12 Of the 12,000 odd Coast Guards operating along the Makran Coast, only 90 are Baluchi and there are only 900 of them in the Frontiers Constabulary in charge of the provinces security. The Nation, 11 April 2005.
9

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The Baluchis in Gwadar fear more than anything else that they will become a minority in their own land. If the federal governments plans succeed, the population of Gwadar and its surrounding areas will rise from 70,000 to almost 2 million. The Baluchis are convinced that the majority will be Sindhis and Punjabis. III. The government is constructing military garrisons in the three most sensitive areas of Baluchistan Sui, with its gas-production installations, Gwadar, with its port and Kohlu, the capital of the Marri tribe to which most of the nationalist hardliners belong. The Baluchis, feeling already they are being colonized by the Pujabis, feel dispossessed by these projects. Behind these three problems, which Baluchis consider a casus belli, looms the demand for autonomy, if not for total independence. While the Islamabad considers Baluchistans resources as national property, and has acted accordingly, Baluchis are demanding that the provinces resources be used only for their own benefit. The Resurgence of Baloch Nationalism Islamabad has always denied the existence of Baluch nationalism, but Baluchis lay claim to a history going back 2,000 years. Its most significant milestones are the confederation of 44 Baluchi tribes under the leadership of Mir Jalal Khan in the 12th century, the confederation of Rind Laskhari in the 15th century and the establishment of the Khanate of Baluchistan in the 17th century. The Moghul and Tatar invasions and the wars and mass migrations in the 13th and 14th centuries also confirmed and reinforced the idea of a national identity.13 British administrators claimed a narrow strip of land adjoining Afghanistan called British Baluchistan, but beyond that, refrained from interfering in the affairs of Baluchistan as long as the Baluchis did not deny access to Afghanistan to the British Army. They paid the Sardars (tribal chiefs), whom they allowed autonomy, for this favor. The Baluchis had secretly campaigned for independence during the final decades of the British empire, and they were shocked by the inclusion of Baluchistan in Pakistan in 1947.14 The Baluchi nationalists desire for independence clashed with the aims of the Pakistan government, which wanted to destroy the power of the tribal chiefs and concentrate all authority in the hands of the federal government.15 Baluchi identity was to be assimilated into the larger Pakistani identity. Since independence, Islamabad has come into conflict with the Baluchis on four occasions -- in 1948, 1958, and 1962 and, most vigorously, from 1973 to 1977 when a growing guerrilla movement led to an armed insurrection that ravaged the province. During this last period, some 55,000 tribals fought against 70,000 men of the Pakistan Army, deepening the resentment Baluchi nationalists felt toward Islamabad.
13

Taj Mohammad Breseeg, Baloch Nationalism: its Origin and Development, Karachi, Royal Book Company, 2004, p. 22. 14 See Selig S. Harrison, In Afghanistans Shadow: Baluch Nationalism and Soviet Temptations, New York/Washington D. C., Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 1981, pp. 22-24. 15 In practice, the central government has adapted itself perfectly to the continuance of the tribal system and co-opts its chiefs to consolidate its power over the province.

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The similarity between the period preceding the insurrection in 1973 and the present situation in Baluchistan is quite striking. It was during the 1960s that the nationalist movement acquired its peculiar characteristics that are evident even today. When the army, after the clash in 1962, began to increase its garrisons in the interior of the province, politically motivated Baluchis, who wanting to follow in the footsteps of Marxist-Leninist national liberation movements, began to plan a resistance movement capable of defending Baluchi national interests. A score of ideologically motivated men got together under the leadership of Sher Mohammed Marri and worked secretly for almost two years to set up what would become the basic structure of the 1973 insurrection. In July 1963, 22 camps of different sizes were set up to cover a vast array of territories ranging from lands belonging to the Mengal tribes in the south to those of the Marris in the north. Managed by some 400 full-time volunteers, each camp consisted of several hundred loosely organised reservists who could be mobilized according to the specific requirements of each operation.16 This movement later became the Baloch Peoples Liberation Front (BPLF). The BPLF didnt initially seek independence. But alienated from Pakistan during the 1973-1977 confrontation, Baluch nationalists, particularly those of the younger generation, adopted independence as their goal.17 At the end of the conflict, their leader, Khair Bux Marri, chief of the largest Baluch tribe living in the eastern part of the province,18 took refuge in Afghanistan, where, working within a Marxist-Leninist framework, he continued to fight for the recognition of the rights of nationalities. 19 From the end of the conflict in the 1970s to the summer of 2004 that the major trends underlying the present Baluch national movement gradually emerged: Khair Bux Marri, who returned to Pakistan in early 1991, is thought to be the leader of the Baloch Liberation Army (BLA), a clandestine militant group that was formed in the early 1980s and was close to Moscow until 1991. It was responsible for most of the attacks against the government. It demanded the creation of a Greater Baluchistan, which would include the Baluch territories in Iran and Afghanistan. The most moderate faction led by Ghous Bakhsh Bizenjo formed a new political party, the Pakistan National Party (PNP). It has called for extensive provincial autonomy that would limit the federal government to controlling defense, foreign affairs, currency and communications. It has demanded simultaneously a re-demarcation of the provinces on linguistic and cultural lines. Convinced that the armed struggle had very little chance of success, the PNP has concentrated all its efforts on winning political support for nationalism among the Baluch peoples.

16 17

Selig Harrison, op. cit., p. 30 Feroz Ahmad, Ethnicity and Politics in Pakistan, Karachi, Oxford University Press, 1999, p. 176. 18 It is in this region that the bloodiest battles took place during the 1973-1977 conflict. 19 He was wooed by the communist government in Kabul and his son, Nawabzada Balaach Marri, was sent to Moscow for higher studies. It was only in 1991 that he returned to Baluchistan and the region under his control is even today the most dangerous for the Pakistani armed forces.

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Ataullah Mengal, leader of the Baloch National Movement (BNM) and chief of the second largest Baluch tribe, played an important role along with Marri in instigating the 1973 revolt. At the end of this revolt, he went into self-imposed exile, settling down in London where he set up the Sind-Baloch-Pushtun Front (SBPF), a simple body representing Sindhi, Pashtoon and Baluch nationalist organisations. The SBPF demanded the transformation of Pakistan into a confederation in which each state had the right to secede, and in which the federal governments power would be limited to whatever each of the sovereign states delegated to it. Soon afterwards, Mengal distanced himself from this organization. Today, Ataullah Mengal plays a minor role. When he takes part in the political debate defending the rights of the Baluch people, he does not speak like his counterpart Marri as the head of an important armed rebel force. Meanwhile, the BNM, which merged in 1996 with the PNP, whose leader Bizenjo had passed away in 1989. The leaders of the BNM and PNP founded the Baloch National Party (BNP).20 The Baluchistan Students Organisation (BSO) suddenly emerged during this same period. Its various factions supported one or the other of the three parties mentioned above, but that did not prevent it from acting as an independent party. It has campaigned for a multi-national Pakistan and for the revival of Baluch nationalism.21 It generally represents the aspirations of the educated, but underemployed, Baluch middle class. It calls for the continuation of quotas22 and for the recognition of the Baluchi language as a medium of instruction in the province. Akbar Bugti, another important leader of the Baluch revolt today, leads a force of some 10,000 tribal insurgents. A moderate like Bizenjo, Bugti is nevertheless Islamabads public enemy number one because of the gas in his territory and the royalties it generates. The Pakistani government held him up as the symbol of the obscurantist and narrow-minded sardars whom it blames for the Baluch problem. In the spring of 2005, the Pakistan government concentrated its attention solely on the Dera Bugti district (where the principal gas reserves of the province are located) and on Bugti, its chief, even though attacks were increasing in the entire Baluch territory, and especially in the non-tribal areas. The Pakistani government contends that the entire Baluch problem is the result of the cupidity of a few corruptible and corrupt sardars strongly opposed to any development that would threaten their power. But of the 28 odd sardars who matter in Baluchistan, only three have risen in open revolt against the government. Besides, even though the nationalist parties are often tribal parties,23 the revolt has spread well beyond the tribal areas, particularly to Makhran.

20

Siddiq Baloch, Balochistan National Party in A.B.S. Jafri, The Political Parties of Pakistan, Karachi, Royal Book Company, 2002, p. 17. 21 Tahir Amin, Ethno-National Movements of Pakistan, Islamabad, Institute of Policy Studies, 1988, pp. 199-200. 22 Each province is theoretically represented in the administration and the army in proportion to its population. 23 This is notably the case with the Balochistan Peoples Liberation Front which is above all a Marri party and the Jamhori Watan Party which represents the Bugtis. The Baloch National Party, which tried to extend its influence in the whole province, could not penetrate the regions controlled by the two former parties.

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Bugti, Mengal, and Marri, the principal tribal chiefs in open rebellion against the government, are highly suspicious of each other. Ataullah Mengal and Khair Bux Marri represent two extreme and contrary tendencies: Mengal has limited forces at his disposal and is therefore naturally inclined to negotiate while Marri looks at the problem from an almost exclusively military angle. Bugti knows how to use the sizeable force at his command as an instrument of negotiation, but he has to contend with the distrust of his peers stemming from his controversial role in the civil war of 1973.24 However, the three tribal chiefs know that any division in the movement would be suicidal. The chiefs unity in spite of difference reflects the larger reality of Baluchistan, where the tribes are in conflict with one another but are united in the defence of a territory that they believe they own jointly. The Baluch movement is not confined to the tribal areas but has spread to the entire province. (The only exceptions are the Pathan territories in the north and the border areas adjoining Afghanistan, which were incorporated into Baluchistan in 1971 and which the Baluchis do not consider to be part of Baluchistan.) Attacks have multiplied in the coastal areas during the last few months. When Islamabad scheduled a visit on March 21 by President Musharraf and the Chinese Prime Minister to inaugurate the Port of Gwadar, it had to be cancelled because a general strike and protests that that raged for three days and destroyed shops belonging to the non-Baluch population. Islamabad blamed the troubles mainly on the godfathers of the local mafias (whose number seems to have decreased after the repression that followed the killing of two Chinese workers in 2004), but the nationalist phenomenon is as significant there as in other parts of the province.

In the Gwadar region, a nationalist revolt against Islamabad is also being driven by a middle class that that is woefully under-represented in the Pakistani administration and army, especially in the higher ranks. It has found a champion for its demands in the Baloch National Movement founded by Abdul Hayee Baloch in the early 1980s. This middle class provides the movement with many of its educated cadres. [ok] It is allergic to a separate agreement, either collective or individual, between Islamabad and the tribal chiefs and knows how to take political advantage of tribal rivalries by imposing itself as an arbiter. Its presence makes it difficult for either Bugti who represents the Jamhori Watan Party or Mengal, who represents the Balochistan National Movement (Mengal Faction), to reach a separate agreement with the central government. Afraid of being marginalised, Ataullah Mengal, for example, has adopted a more radical stance and no longer demands autonomy for his area, but independence for Baluchistan. With each of the parties and their leaders looking over their shoulders at each other, Islamabad has been unable to divide the movement by arresting some of its leaders, buying off others, attempting to foment conflict among them, or taking advantage of the lack of central communications to spread divisive disinformation.
24

Though he was one of the initiators of the rebellion, Akbar Bugti is supposed to have provided information to Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, then Prime Minister, about the supply of arms from Irak. Bhutto used this incident as a pretext to dissolve the provincial assembly and arrest Mengal, Marri and Bizenjo. As for Bugti, he was appointed governor of Baluchistan before he in his turn was sent to prison by Bhutto. See Selig Harrison, op. cit. p.35.

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Foreign Intervention? Pakistans press, claiming that Baluchistans rebels possess highly sophisticated armaments, is constantly discussing the possibility of foreign intervention in the province.25 Ever since the crisis started, the press has been repeating official declarations and spreading rumours about a foreign hand being responsible for the troubles in Baluchistan. The Chief Minister of the province, Jam Mohammed Yousaf, declared on 13 August 2004 that the Indian secret services (RAW) were maintaining 40 terrorist camps all over the Baluch territory.26 More recent articles have continued to refer to India, but they also have expressed suspicion about Iranian and even American involvement.27 India, a traditional enemy, has been suspected, since it reopened its consulates in Jalalabad and Kandahar, of wanting to forge an alliance with Afghanistan against Pakistan. At the least, it is thought to want to exert pressure on Pakistans western border to force it to give up once and for all its terrorist activities in Kashmir and, if possible, to bring the composite dialogue to an end on terms favorable to India. India is supposed to consider Chinas role in the construction of the Gwadar port a potential threat to its economic and strategic interests in the region. (Some Indian analysts have linked the construction of the Gwadar port to Chinas setting up listening-post on Burmas Coco Island to keep a watch on Indias maritime activities and its missile tests in Orissa.28) Admiral Madhavendra Singh, chief of the Indian Navy, has expressed fears that ties forged by the Chinese Navy with some of Indias neighbours may endanger Indias vital sea routes to the Persian Gulf.29 The Pakistanis also suspect Iran of supporting Baluch activists in order to counter a Pakistani-American plot to make Baluchistan a rear base in a future offensive against Teheran.30 Iran, which is keen to become the preferred outlet to the sea for Central Asia at Pakistans expense, has built its own port at Chabahar with Indian assistance.31 However, Iranian involvement is unlikely. Teheran has denied any involvement in the troubles in Baluchistan, claiming that it is not hostile to the Gwadar project.32 If it were to get involved in the Baluch imbroglio, it would probably not be in opposition to Pakistan, and certainly not because of its rivalry with Pakistan over providing an outlet to the sea for Central Asia. Iran and Pakistan have a common interest in exporting Iranian gas to India, and an insurrection in Baluchistan would only harm their chances of building a gas pipeline through the province.33 Iran also has reason to worry about Baluchistans claims to its border regions. Indeed, Teheran had sent

The News, February 2, 2005 The Herald (Karachi), September 2004 27 The News, February 2, 2005 28 Zia Haider, Baluchis, Beijing and Pakistans Gwadar Port, Georgetown Journal of International Affairs, Winter/Spring 2005, pp. 95-103, p.98 29 Indian Navy concerned over Chinas expanding reach, Times of India, 21 May 2003. 30 Daily Times, January 29, 2005. 31 Zia Haider, op. cit., p. 99. 32 Daily Times, February 7, 2005 33 Daily Times, February 5, 2005.
26

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helicopters to Islamabad between 1973 and 1977 to help it put down the Baluchi insurrection. Finally, the Baluchis as well as the Pakistanis see the United States as a potential trouble-maker. Some Pakistanis suspect that Washington would like to use Baluchistan as a rear base for an attack on Iran and would also like to get Chinas out of the region.34 They do not make clear which side the Americans are on: whether they are opposing the Baluch nationalists because they are supported by Iran or whether they supporting the Baluchis because they are hostile to the Chinese. Other Pakistanis see a continuation of the Great Power Game being played in Central Asia since the collapse of the Soviet Union. According to this view, the United States, in competition with China and Iran, would like to control the oil-supply lines from the Middle East and Central Asia; and it would like to use its Greater Middle East initiative to dismantle the major Muslim states and redefine borders in the region.35 On the other hand, some Baluch nationalists charge the United States with conspiring with the Pakistani government to put an end to their claims. But so far nobody has been able to prove any of these accusations. Contrary to Pakistani suspicions, it is also not certain that Baluchistan really needs outside financial support. The province is in fact an important center for the traffic of arms and drugs36 that generates, sometimes with the complicity of corrupt intelligence officers, a very substantial income capable of financing the supply of arms and ammunitions to local armed groups. The Governor disclosed in April 2005 that arms valued at about Euros 6.4 million had secretly entered the province during the six previous months in spite of the 600 odd check posts spread all over the territory.37 In addition, a large Baluch Diaspora working in the Gulf is capable of helping to finance these groups. Exploiting Islamism Pakistani charges that the Baluchi rebels are being financed abroad are mainly important for what they are trying to achieve politically: they could serve to mobilize international support for Pakistan, particularly from the United States, and neutralize opposition to a Pakistani military intervention. The charges are part of a larger effort to discredit Baluchi nationalism. They should be seen alongside Pakistani attempts to use the specter of Islamism to undermine the claims of Baluch nationalism in Pakistan and internationally. Following the policies adopted by Zia-ul-Haq in the 1980s, the Pakistani government continues through its Ministry of Religious Affairs to encourage the setting up of madrasas in the province in order to penetrate deeper into the ethnic Baluch areas stubbornly opposed to the Mullahs. Setting up these religious schools has been at the expense of secular education whose lack is even more noticeable in Baluchistan than in the rest of the country. The budget of the Ministry of Religious Affairs for the province is said to be about Rs.1.2 billion as compared to Rs.200 million allotted to the Ministry of Education. It inevitably follows that there is an increase in the role of
34 35

US will not like significant presence in Balochistan, Daily Times, January 30, 2005. Balochistan and the Great Power Games, The News, February 3, 2005. 36 Also in complicity with Afghan refugee camps (Dalbandin, Chaman, Quetta,). 37 The Nation, 11 April 2005.

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the clergy, angering nationalists who have been demanding for a long time that the Ministry of Religious Affairs be dismantled.38 The growing power of the clergy enhanced by the manipulation of elections enabling the religious parties and particularly Fazl-ur-Rehmans Jamaat Ulema-iIslami to join the provincial government in October 2002 has allowed the federal government to draw the attention of foreign powers to the risk of the spread of fundamentalism in the region and to launch a systematic disinformation campaign equating the Baluch resistance with Islamic terrorism. The Pakistani intelligence services have linked nationalist militancy to the terrorism of Al Qaeda and the Taliban.39 (Ironically, when the Baluch insurgents took refuge in Afghanistan, they sided with the communist forces and their Soviet protectors.40) The same attempt at disinformation dictates the identification of Baluchi nationalism with Irans Islamic revolution at a time when the United States and Western Europe are protesting Teherans nuclear ambitions. What would be the Consequences of an Independent Baluchistan? If Baluchistan were to become independent, would Pakistan be able to withstand another dismemberment its 34 years since the secession of Bangladesh and what would be the effect on regional stability. Pakistan would lose of a major part of its natural resources and would become more dependent on the Middle East for its energy supplies. Though Baluchistans resources are presently under-exploited and benefit only the non-Baluch provinces, especially Punjab, these resources could undoubtedly contribute to the development of an independent Baluchistan.

Baluchistans independence would also dash Islamabads hopes for the Gwadar port and other related projects. Any chance that Pakistan would become more attractive to the rest of the world would be lost. Pakistans losses from an eventual secession would not be limited to the economic domain, however. While the central government could still find facilities to test its nuclear weapons and missiles, it would have to be in and above more populated areas. Some nationalists, who are fully aware that they hold a trump card that would allow them to play on international sensitivities, claim that they would accept right away the denuclearisation of the future Baluch state in exchange for international support in their struggle for independence. Neighbouring countries are also not very enthusiastic about the prospect of Pakistan weakened by the secession of Baluchistan. Afghanistan and Iran, which in 1973 sent its military helicopters to assist Pakistani armed forces, both have a strong Baluch minority in their territories. They dont want a Baluchi state on their south-eastern border whose raison dtre is essentially ethnic. The independence of Pakistani Baluchistan would inevitably give rise to the fear of the revival of Baluch support for a Greater Baluchistan.
Interview with Senator Sanaullah Baloch, Islamabad, 30 January 2005. Pakistani forces may face lengthy conflict on Afghan border, Daily Times, January 27, 2005 40 Several young leaders of the Baluch Liberation Army are supposed to have received training in the former Soviet Union.
39 38

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India may be tempted to look at the further partition of Pakistan as a opportunity for forging a new anti-Pakistan alliance. But while an insurrection in Baluchistan could pressure Islamabad to resolve their bilateral conflict on Kashmir, a change of regional boundaries could revive fears of irredentism in Kashmir and in the territories of the Northeast that a revengeful Pakistan would be only too eager to exploit. In spite of the secular nature of Baluchi nationalism, the United States is worried about the possibility of a war of independence complicating their fight against Islamist terrorism in the region. If the United States were to undertake a military action against Iran, it could also use Pakistani Baluchistan for conducting subversive acts in Iranian Baluchistan. But for the United States to be able to do this, the Pakistani province would have to remain calm and not pose a threat to the interests of Washingtons allies. The final question is whether an independent Baluchistan would be a viable state, or whether it would become in itself a threat to regional stability. [ok?] If Baluchistan were not to receive foreign aid, it could not necessarily exploit the control of its natural resources it would gain from independence. With a ridiculously low level of literacy,41 and a lack of administrative experience, Baluchistan may not at present have the human resources required to develop its natural resources. Baluchistans sparse population, which is scattered over a huge area, would also affect the economic and political viability of the new state. And its ethnic composition could pose problems. According to the 1998 census, the population of Baluchistan was estimated to be 6.511 million, of which 6 million consisted of about 3.5 million Baluchis, 2.5 million Pashtoons and a little more than 500,000 belonging to other ethnic groups.42 The Baluchis dont see this as a handicap because the Pashtoon population is found in the northern part of the province and along the Afghan border, territories that are not historically a part of Baluchistan.43 But they do worry about projects like the Gwadar port that by bringing in non-Baluchis could bring about a marked change in the provinces ethnic balance. While there are strong Baluch minorities settled outside the province, in view of the lack of adequate development in Baluchistan, they are not likely to return to their homeland once it becomes independent. If Pakistan is divided at some time in the future, an independent Baluchistan will become in all probability a new zone of instability in the region. Its instability would affect the interests of all the regional players. Yet, unless Pakistan changes its policy towards Baluchistan dramatically, the possibility of Baluchistan eventually gaining its independence cannot be ruled out.

41

According to the 1998 census, the rate of literacy was 24.8% for the Baluch population (34% for men and 14.1% for women). Population Census Report, 1998. The level of functional literacy (i.e. the ability not only to decipher a text but also to analyse it empirically) is however lower than the official figures. 42 The Nation, 11 April 2005 43 Although the Baluchi-speaking population is presently in a minority in the areas claimed by the nationalists. Aijaz Ahmad, The National Question in Balochistan, in S. Akbar Zadi (Ed.), Regional Imbalance and the National Question in Pakistan, Lahore, Vanguard Books, 1992, p. 196.

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Conclusion In the absence of foreign support, which does not appear imminent, the Baluch movement cannot prevail over a determined central government whose military strength is obviously superior to its own. Still, it can have a considerable nuisance value. The risk of a prolonged guerrilla movement in Baluchistan is quite real. Most observers concur that the Baluchi nationalists are raising the stakes to strengthen their negotiating position vis--vis the central government. Movement leaders have made it known that they would be satisfied with a generous version autonomy. [ok?] But in the absence of their winning autonomy, the medium- and long-term consequences of the struggle for independence cannot be predicted today. The outbreak of another civil war in Baluchistan between the nationalists and the Pakistani Army cannot be ruled out if the Baluchis minimum demands are not met. Almost six decades of intermittent conflict have given rise to a deep feeling of mistrust towards the central government. The Baluchis will not forget General Pervez Musharrafs recent promises and the insults hurled from time to time at certain nationalist leaders. The projects that were trumpeted as the means to Baluchistans development and integration have so far only led to the advance of the Pakistani military in the province, accompanied by the removal of the local population from their lands and by an intense speculation that benefits only the army and its flunkies. Baluch nationalism is a reality that Islamabad cannot pretend to ignore forever or coopt by making promises of development that are rarely kept. For the moment, with little certainty about the conclusion of an agreement between the central government and the nationalist leaders,44 the province is likely to enter a new phase of violence whose long-term consequences are difficult to predict. This conflict could be used in Pakistan and elsewhere as a weapon against the Pakistani government. Such a prospect would affect not only Pakistan but possibly all its neighbors. It is ultimately Islamabad that must decide whether Baluchistan will become its Achilles heel.

44

The report of the Pakistani Senates sub-committee for Balochistan contains proposals that will not have any major impact on the situation and are likely to go unheeded.

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HRCP Balochistan mission preliminary statement 26 October 2003.

Human Rights in Balochistan & Balochistna's Rights Report of a fact-finding mission-June 2004

Balochistan Conflict HRCP Fact Finding Mission December -2005-Jannuary -2006.

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HRCP Balochistan mission preliminary statement


26 October 2003. Quetta, October 26: While the human rights situation is not satisfactory in any part of Pakistan, the problems being faced by the people of Balochistan can be likened to the plight of tailenders in the canal system. Increased concerns at denial of provincial rights and growing military encroachment upon civil administration, exclusion of people from affecting their basic rights, unsatisfactory functioning of subordinate courts and the various branches of administration, evidence of police collusion with criminal elements and the drug mafia's accession to strength figure prominently in the findings of HRCP's mission to Balochistan. Responding to the persistently expressed anxieties of the Balochistan population, HRCP organized a fact-finding mission. Teams comprising HRCP office-bearers and council members and supported by activists held inquiries and met with local representatives at Gwadar, Turbat, Khuzdar, Loralai and Quetta. While a detailed report based on the mission's observations will be ready after some time, HRCP deems it necessary to release a preliminary report. At all places visited by the fact-finding teams, serious complaints about continued denial of provincial autonomy were received. The people were quite agitated about their exclusion from decision-making at both federal and provincial levels and resistance to the LFO was vigorously expressed. Anxiety at erosion of rule of law, declining faith in the judicial system and procedure and difficulties in access to justice was quite pronounced. There was considerable dissatisfaction with the multidiscipline judicial system, especially with the way the Qazi courts functioned. A matter of serious concern to the people is the Gwadar mega-project. The idea of Gwadar development is meaningless without improvement in quality in life of the local people. The local community has apparently not been taken into confidence in the port city's master plan and is acutely unhappy at the authorities' failure to address its apprehensions, especially those related to the displacement of the fisher folk and disruption of their economic life. There is urgent need to end the exclusion of the people from decision-making and strike a rational balance between the demands of development and the indigenous community's right to their land and traditional economic activities. The mission is of the view that obduracy in ignoring the genuine demands and grievances of the people will accentuate their alienation from the state and sharpen tensions in the society. It is also necessary to take note of the allegations of massive irregularities in land settlement operations and allotment practices as well as the local community's need for assistance in skill development in various aspects of Gwadar port development, proper storage facilities and

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The fact-finding teams noted the following as some of the principal concerns of the people in Balochistan: 1. Apart from their complaints of exclusion from decision-making and interference with their rights on their resources, local communities are suffering from lack of employment opportunities and denial of jobs, even as unskilled labour. The denial of rights to livelihood is often mentioned. 2. There is widespread anxiety at the plans to establish new cantonments. Besides, grievances stemming from the military's increasing involvement with all aspects of civilian life, including the working of the police and local bodies, are on the rise. The intelligence agencies are regularly blamed for interference with the administration and citizen's rights to security and personal freedoms. 3. At several places, such as Turbat, police collusion with criminal elements, especially the drug mafia, is a major problem. There are widespread complaints of the involvement of the Frontier Constabulary, the coastguards and ANF with drug barons. The people are afraid of complaining, as the fear of drug traffickers' retaliation is strong. 4. Considerable evidence has been presented about the strengthening of the sardari system with extremely deleterious effect on the system of justice, the functioning of the local bodies, the rights of women, minorities and the socially underprivileged. 5. The institutions supposed to look after the people's needs in the area of education and health are inadequate in number and suffer from lack of both human and material resources. The disadvantaged are deprived of even the scanty facilities the elite is allowed to enjoy. 6. While at some places, the traditional tolerance for differences of belief has survived, and a decline in the anti-Zikri campaign is a welcome development, quite a few incidents reveal unwelcome tendencies towards discrimination against the minority communities and sects. The acts of violence against the minorities have declined but they appear afraid of articulating their concerns. 7. The conditions of detention at prisons are quite below the minimum acceptable standards. The worst sufferers are juveniles and women. HRCP plans to present specific recommendations on ways to meet the problems and human rights concerns in its detailed report, but the need to end the Balochistan population's exclusion from matters affecting its collective interests and individual freedoms is already manifest. The prominent members of the fact-finding mission were: Ms Hina Jilani, HRCP Secretary-General, and Council Members Syed Iqbal Haider, Mr Kamran Arif, Mr Rochi Ram, Mr Peter Jacob, Mr Joseph Francis, Mr Asif Khan, Ms Uzma Noorani,

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Mr Roland DeSouza, Ms Shataj Qizalbash and Mr Jam Saqi. The mission members met with officials, police officers, lawyers, NGO representatives, nazims and a number of human rights and social activists. http://www.hrcp-web.org/balochistan_mission.cfm

http://www.hrcp-web.org/pub_other_book_balochistan.cfm

Human Rights in Balochistan & Balochistna's Rights


Report of a fact-finding mission

June 2004
Introduction The Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP) has been taking various measures to apprise itself of the state of human rights in the province of Balochistan. The provincial chapter at Quetta keeps an eye on developments, positive as well as negative, that have any bearing on the basic rights of the people. It organises, among other activities, fact-finding missions as and when warranted by circumstances. Investigations into human rights violations of local nature are regularly carried out by district core groups and activists. Their reports are published in the monthly Jehd-i-Haq, of which a combined Balochi-Pushtu edition is also published. In 2001 when large parts of the province were hit by drought the HRCP chairperson Afrasiab Khattak himself led an inquiry mission. Every two years or so the HRCP Council, the organisations executive body, meets in Quetta to enable its members to gain first-hand knowledge of the ground reality and interact with the leaders of public opinion and the provincial civil society. However, the need for continuous overseeing of the human rights situation in Balochistan, as in other parts of the country, can hardly be gainsaid. In October 2003 the commission decided to organise a high-powered fact-finding mission to undertake a broad survey of the human rights situation over a sizeable area of the province. The mission was led by the HRCP Secretary-General, Ms Hina Jilani, who is also the UN Secretary-Generals Special Representative on Human Rights Defenders, and included 13 other members of the Council. The mission was divided into five teams that visited Gwadar, Turbat (and Tump), Khuzdar, Loralai and Quetta. (See Annexure I) The members of the teams met a large number of people in the administration, as well as representatives of the political opinions, lawyers, journalists, and social activists, to elicit their views on a broad range of issues of concern to them. A preliminary mission statement containing a summary of its findings, was released to the media on October 26, 2003. (See Annexure II) A more detailed report of the missions findings and recommendations is given in the following pages. HRCP is conscious of the fact that its mission may not have been able to cover each and every issue of concern to the people of Balochistan and that some of the matters it tried to address demand further study and analysis. However, it has decided to release this report because it does touch upon quite a few issues that have been agitating the minds of the conscious sections of the Balochistan society. These issues call for urgent remedial action by the state and the civil society both if they are not to be allowed to develop into serious and dangerous causes of discontent. A large number of people responded to the call of the mission at short notice and freely gave of their time. HRCP thanks them for their kind and generous support and acknowledges their contribution to the furtherance of the cause of human rights. The whole of Balochistan, as usual, was a wonderful host and HRCP hopes to be able to savour more of its hospitality and its candid discourse.

THE COMPLETE REPORT IS VAILBLE ON HRCP WEBSITE


http://www.hrcp-web.org/pub_other_book_balochistan.cfm

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Proof of Army operation in Balochistan

Pictures of damage houses, unexploded rockets 16.1.06

WORLD-WIDE DEMOSTRATION, PROTEST, PROCESSIONS BY BALOCH POLITICAL PARTIES AND ACTIVISITS


AGAINST RUTHELESS MILITARY OPERATION AND HUMAN RIGHTS VIOLATION IN BALOCHISTAN

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Proof of Army operation in Balochistan


Pictures of damage caused by bombs, rocket and heavy machine gun fired from Pakistani Fighter Jets and Gunship helicopters in Marri area on innocent civilians and pictures of unexploded guided missiles and rocket. After all this massacre of the Baloch people by Punjabi Pakistan and its army deny of any army operation in Marri, Bugti and other areas of Balochistan. 1.1.06

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BALOCHISTAN, Quetta; 2nd April 2006

2nd April 2006, more then 60,000 Sixty Thousand People in Quetta took Part in a Rally organized by Balochistan National party, against Military Operation and Human Rights Violation by Pakistan Army in Balochistan;

BNP President Sardar Akhatar Mengal is addressing to Rally

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BALOCH PUSHTOON SOLIDARITY;


Baloch and Pushtoon Leaders joined their Hand against Military operation

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LONDON, 10 Downing Street-24 Jannuary 2006


Baloch Activists Demonstrate against Human Rights violation and military Operation in Balochistan Date: 24/01/06

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LONDON, 10 Downing Street-02 February 2005


Baloch Action Committee UK, Demonstration in London against the on going military operation in Balochistan Date: 06/02/05

NORWAY, Oslo; 24-01-2006


NORWAY, Oslo; Baloch Community and Political Activists Demonstration against HR Violations and Military Operation in front of Norwegian Parliament during Visit of Pakistans military Dictator General Musharf Visit to Norway. Date..

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USA, WASHINGTON;
USA, Washington; Baloch Community USA and BSO-NA Joint Demonstration, Against the Pakistani Military Regimes Brutal Operation in Balochistan.

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LONDON; 02-03-2005
London; Demonstration by BRM (Balochistan Rights Movement) in London against abduction of Baloch and Sindhi political activists Date 02/03/05

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Noraway, Oslo, 05-05-2006 Senator Sanaullah Baloch addressing Baloch Conference in Oslo

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LONDON; 23-04-2006
London; 23-04-2006. Demonstration by Baloch Sindhi Forum, Balochistan Action committee in 10 Downing Street London Against Military Operation in Balochistan

Human rights commission of Pakistan Chair Person Ms. Asma Jhangir, Waja Ismeal Ameeri, Mr. Javed Mengal, Mr. Mehran Baluch Presenting a memorandum to British Prime Minister Tony Blair residence at 10 Downing Street London.

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NORWAY, Oslo; 20-05-2006.


Norway, Oslo; 20-05-2006. Balochistan Peoples Party , Baloch Action Committee joint demonstration against the Army action and Human rights violation in Iranian and Pakistani occupied Balochistan by both Army and Mullah Regimes. It is reminded two days before this protest the Iranian force bombed a Baloch village with gunship helicopters leaving dead several innocent Baloch civilians!

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LONDON; ULU, 28-05-2006.


London; 28-05-2006 University of London Union; Conference on Balochistan Organised by BNM Iranian Controlled Balochistan Against Human Rights Violations, Abduction of innocent people in Balochistan and Against the Nuclear Test in Chaghi Balochistan which resulted in death of hundreds of innocent people.

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