Top Article: A Home-grown Conflict

Malik Siraj Akbar11 August 2009, 12:00am IST

When the first Baloch insurgency broke out in 1948 to resist the illegal and forceful annexation of the Baloch-populated autonomous Kalat state
with Pakistan, Manmohan Singh - today Indian prime minister - was barely a teenager while his Pakistani counterpart Yousuf Raza Gilani had not even been born to witness the rebellion's magnitude. Yet, last month, both leaders in Sharm el-Sheikh discussed for the first time the indefatigable Baloch insurgency.

Pakistan has been blaming India for causing trouble in its resource-rich province. Gilani broached the issue with India at a time disgruntled Baloch youth have removed the Pakistani flag from schools and colleges and stopped playing the national anthem. Punjabi officers refuse to serve in Balochistan, fearing they would be target-killed. Islamabad attributes the unrest to 'foreign involvement'. India is not the first to be blamed. Similar allegations were levelled in the past against the now defunct Soviet Union, Afghanistan and Iraq to discredit the indigenous movement for retaining a distinct Baloch identity. Indian assistance sounds ridiculous given that the Baloch do not share a border, common language, religion or history with India. Hardly has 1 per cent of Balochs have visited India.

The idea of Pakistan never attracted the secular Baloch. Ghose Baksh Bizanjo, a Baloch leader, said in 1947: "It is not necessary that by virtue of our being Muslims we should lose our freedom... If the mere fact that we are Muslims requires us to join Pakistan, then Afghanistan and Iran... should also amalgamate with Pakistan."

Over the years, Islamabad has applied a multi-pronged approach to deal with Balochista Apart from military operations launched in 1948, 1958, 1962, 1973 and 2002 to quash the rebellion, Islamabad adopted other tactics. First, it kept the province economically backward by denying it good infrastructure, mainly in education and health. Natural gas was discovered in Balochistan in 1951 and supplied to Punjab's industrial units. The Balochs hardly benefit from their own gas.

Second, Balochs, whom the state views as traitors, were denied representation in the army, foreign services, federal departments, profitable corporations, Pakistan International Airlines, customs, railways and other key institutions. Third, Balochistan has historically been remote-controlled from Islamabad. A Pakistan army corps commander, often a Punjabi or a Pathan, and the inspector general of the Frontier Corps, a federal paramilitary force with less than 2 per cent Baloch representation, exert more power than the province's elected chief minister. The intelligence agencies devise election plans and decide who has to come to the provincial parliament and who should be ousted.

Fourth, Islamabad has created a state of terror inside Balochistan. Hundreds of check posts have been established to harass people and restrict their movement. Forces and tanks are stationed even on campuses of universities. Fifth, national and international media are denied access to conflict zones in Balochistan. Several foreign journalists were beaten up supposedly by intelligence agencies personnel or deported when they endeavoured to report the actual situation. Sixth, international human rights organisations are denied access to trace the whereabouts of some 5,000 'missing persons'. Pakistan is also in a state of denial about the existence of around 2,00,000 internally displaced persons in Balochistan.

Seventh, Islamabad has been engaged in systematic target killing of key Baloch democratic leaders. Ex-governor and chief minister of Balochistan, Nawab Akbar Bugti, 79, became a victim once he demanded Baloch rights. Balach Marri, a Balochistan Assembly member, was killed to undermine the movement. In April this year, three other prominent leaders were whisked away by security forces and subsequently killed.

Eighth, Pakistan has pitted radical Taliban against secular and democratic Baloch forces. The state is brazenly funding thousands of religious schools across the province with the help of Arab countries to promote religious radicalisation. Elements supportive of Taliban were covertly helped by state institutions to contest and win general elections. They now enjoy sizeable representation in the Balochistan Assembly to legislate against the nationalists and secular forces.

Ninth, Islamabad has been using sophisticated American weapons, provided to crush Taliban, against the Baloch people. This has provided breathing space to Taliban hidden in Quetta and weeded out progressive elements. Finally, Afghan refugees are being patronised to create a demographic imbalance in the Baloch-dominated province.

Baloch leaders are critical of many democratic countries for not doing 'enough' to safeguard a democratic, secular Baloch people. I asked Bramdagh Bugti, a Baloch commander, about the India link. He laughed and said, "Would our people live amid such miserable conditions if we enjoyed support from India? We are an oppressed people... seeking help from India, the United States, the United Nations and the European Union to come for our rescue."

The Baloch movement is rapidly trickling down from tribal chiefs to educated middle-class youth aggressively propagating their cause on Facebook and YouTube. This generation would understandably welcome foreign assistance but will not give up even if denied help from countries like India. The Baloch insist their struggle was not interrupted even at times when India and Pakistan enjoyed cordial relations.

The writer is Balochistan bureau chief of Daily Times .


Source: The Times Of India

Unforgotten Independence Day

The unknown country once was a colony of Britain ; compromises the area of 347,190 km² & 900 km long coastline declared as an independent country on 11th august 1947 known as Baluchistan.The new ray of hope for a better future came in the life of Baluch nation.But unfortunately after a 7 months of short period of time once again Baluch nation lost their status of independence as Pakistan invaded the Baluchistan on 27th march 1948 and forcibly merged.

Baluch never accepted the merger of Baluchistan with Pakistan from the first day.The
Baluch rebels headed towards the mountains took the positions and started the first Guerrilla fight for the freedom against the pakistani regime.The Baluch freedom fighters warned the occupied army that your pakistani flag does not belong to Baluchistan.But the wicked rulers of pakistan always used the religion islam as a tool to achieve the objective.Pakistani government asked freedom fighters come down to the mountains for negotiations but as a result government arrested most of them ,few kept behind the bars for life and many of them executed.

Afterwards Pakistani government started the method of British ''divide&rule policy''.They had
bought a group of greedy people,who started work within the Pakistani constitution and showed all of them as a real leader of Baluchistan.They made every illegal action legal through such traitors of Baluchistan.They tried to show the world that Baluch are now very much accommodated in the Pakistani system,they have accepted the Pakistan as their homeland.But during that all period occupiers forgot the guerrilla fighters who are now once again organised in a better way with the latest weapon to resist the occupied army.This time freedom fighters are not limited to camps in mountain,they headed down to the towns and streets of Baluchistan.Pakistani army and their informers are not feeling secure in the presence of freedom fighters.Freedom fighters easily targeting the army vehicles,checkposts,cantonments in the day light.Security personels insisting for transfers out of Baluchistan.Pakistani flag & anthem disappeared from the government buildings schools,universities,police-stations.So called Pakistani flag replaced by Baluchistan national flag in all schools,universities student started singing the Baloch national anthem.

Baluch national movement for independence purely supported by baluch masses in Baluchistan.Baluch student organization & baluch nationalist parties organising the mass rallies,protest in the favour of freedom fighters.Pakistani regime disappearing the student activist,political leadership,human right campaigners,brutally torturing them in the military torture cells,threatning them to stop the demand for freedom.But salute to brave sons of balochistan who are not caring the life threats but happily accepting the martyrdom for the holy cause.

Baluch patriot parties,Baluch student organisation and Baluch liberation wings appealed the entire nation to be ready for the celebrations of independence day on 11th august.Baluch freedom fighters recent courageous statement is the new hope for the nation,that they are ready for the final combat and Pakistani forces should be ready to face the worse.Baluchistan independence will be declared on the same day.

After passing sixty years of occupation Baluch nation possess same spirit and courage on 11th august the day of Baluchistan independence, while every year 14th august marked as a black day in Baluchistan; now its the duty of United Nation should immediately consider the ground realities of Baluchistan and solve the baluch national question for independence.

Written by Ali Baluch

A letter from Balochistan

The government of Pakistan has deployed thousands of FC men in the province to subjugate the Baloch nation, loot their wealth and kill the innocent Balochs by hooks or by crooks. Every unfair mean is being used by the Pakistani FC men; search operation is going on in the cities and remote areas of Balochistan. Old, young, children and women are being harassed, and shooting them at the spot is common.

Very interesting news is that, a very well known Porfessor of the University of Balochistan Professor Dr. Shaheen Qaisrani (Islamic Studies Department) was stopped at the University gate, checked him up and used harsh words against the professor. When the professor resisted then the FC men got them out and tore his cloths and beated him harshly. This shameful news spread throughout the University and the students came to the road and staged protest against the Fc but the FC men started beating them very severely. The VC of the University of Balochistan came to cool the situation but none of the FC men listened him. FC men said" we are the follower of law and order, how can we follow the VC who is a teacher."

It is nonsense and ridiculous. Every day the Baloch are being disappeared by the Army men and the Intelligence Agencies. The provincial government is not taking action against the disappearances. Thousands of such incidents are being occurred with the Baloch but the media is silent because the media is pro-government.

I am writing these lines, while i am listing the gun fires on the Saryab road and sirens of embulences I don't know today who is being killed, who is being orphaned!

The deployment of Para-military in Balochistan, What is Pakistan trying to prove?

Pakistan has deployed thousands of Para-military, military and other so called security forces in different region in Balochistan in the name of restoring law and order situation and for the protection of what they call “National Installations”. These are Baluchistan’s National Installations not Pakistan’s, so who has invited Pakistan to come and protect them? Protecting them from whom?

The feelings of people in Balochistan about the deployment of army are totally different they believe the army is there to strengthen the hold on Balochistan land, to further the occupation. Reports from the ground suggest that the Para-military and army are arresting anyone who wears a Balochi Dress. Young Baloch men are being humiliated by the army in the middle of roads in public. Several young men even complained that they were stop and asked to speak Punjabi. The forces there know that Punjabi is not the language of Balochistan but why would they still ask our young men to speak it?

According to a BBC Urdu people from most areas in Balochistan have boycotted by Pakistani flag and students have refused to sing the Pakistani National anthem. Perhaps that is why this year the government and Pakistani army has decided to celebrate the 14 August in a different way “

The Balochistan Provincial Capitol City of Quetta was sprucing up for some of the most tumultuous Independence Day celebrations, ever on 14th Aug.

“The entire City would be lit up with bright lights, and prizes would be distributed among the best, with heavy cash prize of Rs.20, 000 for the top, Rs.15000 for second and Rs.10, 000 for third position holders. A grand display of fireworks would be held on the day, with even mountaintops being decorated with visible colored lights”.

http://www.onlinenews.com.pk/details.php?id=149783

Baloch crackdown after statement

Pakistan accused of torturing students and extracting confession of Indian hand

By K.P. NAYAR

Washington, Aug. 4: For the babus in South Block, the inclusion of Balochistan in the India-Pakistan joint statement is no more than a case of “bad drafting”, but in the restive province on the other side of the border, Balochis are paying with their lives and limbs for the foibles of Indian diplomats who were in Sharm-el-Sheikh.

The Pakistani establishment, crowing in vindication about its line on Balochistan following the joint statement, is heavily stepping up the crackdown on the people in the province, vowing to stamp out not only any traces of secession but even of dissent and legitimate assertion of time-honoured Baloch identity.

Within 48 hours of the release of the joint statement in Sharm-el-Sheikh, the Frontier Constabulary in Quetta abducted Sami Baloch, a leader of the Baloch Student Organisation, while the postgraduate student of Balochistan University was returning from tuition at night.

“His whereabouts are still unknown and it is feared that he is undergoing torture in a Pakistani army camp,” according to a statement by the Asian Human Rights Commission based in Hong Kong.

In another case which is attracting international attention — while India is wrestling with the semantics of the joint statement — Fazal Baloch, a 19-year-old student at Bolan University, was pulled off a bus by plainclothes intelligence officers in Panjgur district of Balochistan, tortured and then formally handed over to the crime branch of the Anti-Terrorist Force in Quetta.

Fazal told his family when he was eventually dumped in a hospital that he was forced to confess under torture that he was aware of India funding an outfit in Balochistan known as the Baloch Liberation Army.

The Hong Kong-based commission said in its statement that “nationalist groups and family members of the disappeared persons say that the Pakistani government is arresting students and young people with the aim to get confessions from them for alleged statements against India for its involvement in Balochistan’s insurgency.”

It added: “The Asian Human Rights Commission urges the government of Pakistan, especially the Balochistan province, to stop the arrest of students and young people and the keeping of them in incommunicado.”

In addition to illegal detentions, abduction and torture, Pakistan’s government is now using new ways in the wake of the joint statement to shut down legitimate outlets for Balochi opinion.

For example, Pakistan’s Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) a few days ago used that country’s draconian Cyber Crime Act to shut down a popular Balochi website, www.balochunity.org.

But as of Sunday, its promoters used facilities in Dubai to revive the website, dissident Balochistan sources told this newspaper.

Pakistan’s Cyber Crime Act prescribes a punishment of up to 14 years in prison for propaganda against Pakistan’s security forces, a tool that is expected to be used to tighten efforts to silence Balochis.

Pakistani sources here have been claiming that Islamabad will now use the joint statement to pressure the US to act against American companies which host legitimate Balochi websites that propagate the history, culture and heritage of the province on the ground that these are part of the cross-border terrorist architecture in Balochistan, funded by India.

Hyrbair Marri, a nationalist leader from Balochistan now living in exile in the UK, pointedly told a recent meeting in the House of Lords organised at the instance of Bri- tain’s Campaign Against Criminalising Communities that Balochistan’s history “pre-dates the formation of Pakistan. We have a history reaching back thousands of years.”

He pointed out that contrary to what Pakistan was now doing in the province, “during the British Raj, Britain... did not interfere in the affairs of Balochistan so long as the Baloch allowed the British Army access to Afghanistan.”

On Sunday, a complete strike was observed in most of Balochistan to protest against the wave of arrests of Baloch leaders in the wake of the Sharm-el-Sheikh joint statement.

Reporting on the strike, a popular nationalist website in exile, balochwarna.com, alleged: “After registration of the accusation against India, the authorities started a new round of arrests with disappearances to get confessions through statements made against India.”

http://www.telegraphindia.com/1090805 ... nation/story_11322822.jsp

We didn’t start the fire

Pakistani officials have tried to insinuate that the Balochistan rebellion is of India’s making. In India, there is denial of any role by covert agencies; and a reaffirmation that Balochistan is Pakistan’s domestic business. Reality is more complex. For some time now, Balochistan has been emerging as the locus of a new Great Game. Regional powers have been using and abetting Baloch tensions for their own reasons. India knows what’s going on, but is more an informed spectator than an active player. If nothing else, its ability to operate in Balochistan is circumscribed by its relationship with Iran.

As far back as the 1970s — just after the Bangladesh war — the then Soviet foreign minister told his Indian counterpart that India should collaborate in fomenting a rebellion in Balochistan. New Delhi demurred. At the time, caches of Iraqi weapons had been found headed towards Baloch tribal chieftains. Iraq was seeking to use Balochistan as a base to instigate violence in neighbouring Iranian Balochistan.

The Iranian Baloch have a different tribal composition from the Pakistani Baloch. However, they too mistrust their national government. Iran’s Baloch are a Sunni minority in a Shia-majority country.

In the early 1970s, India was improving relations with the Shah of Iran and did not want to disrupt that process. Have things changed? Not really. Iranian Balochistan — where India has a consulate in the city of Zahedan — is crucial to the back-up strategy for Afghanistan. In the 1990s, the Iranian and Indian governments collaborated here to provide logistical support to the Northern Alliance.

The possibility — however thin — that the Americans will walk out of Kabul with their job only half done has never quite been dismissed. As such, India has to keep open the option of working with Iran (and Russia) in Afghanistan. That is a compelling priority. The price for it is India steers clear of the Baloch opportunity.

So who then is responsible for Islamabad’s Balochistan headache? The western edge of South Asia is experiencing a tectonic shift. For 30 years, since the Soviet invasion of 1979, successive regimes in Kabul were destabilised by Islamabad. Today, positions have been reversed. The Afghan establishment, at least the faction surrounding President Hamid Karzai, is doing its utmost to destabilise Pakistan. Balochistan is where this experiment is being played out.

Northern Balochistan is a Pushtun stronghold, home to many refugees from the Afghan war of the 1980s. A wing of the Taliban, led by Mullah Omar, is in Quetta, the provincial capital. In the southern part, nomadic Baloch communities have been restive for decades. Islamabad’s writ doesn’t run very far. Kabul has long smelt its chance.

This suits India, but still doesn’t mean India is responsible. Indeed, even the Americans are not quite innocent. Their intelligence agencies are known to have a network in the Baloch belt, in the hope of some day causing a problem for Tehran. The Pakistani Baloch region is a way-station in this journey.

What does it all add up to? Far from converting a domestic insurgency into a bilateral issue, and pinning the blame on India, Pakistan is actually trying to box in an international situation and somehow fit it into a two-country framework. In truth, even if India were to disappear off the face of the planet tomorrow morning, the Baloch mess would remain.

There is one other prism through which to look at the Baloch issue: it offers an alternative model of Muslim oppression. In the past few years, sources of Islamic grievance have become the subject of passionate debate. These are generally seen as Arab/Middle Eastern- Palestine; the presence of American troops in Saudi Arabia — or South Asian, as in Kashmir.

This template offers no space for grievances of Muslim peoples, as opposed to Islamists. The Baloch are one such, and so are the Uighurs and Kurds (people of the BUK, to coin a handy acronym). These are predominantly secular Muslim communities. Each has a small sliver of al-Qaeda-type zealotry but that is not the defining characteristic.

In all three struggles, the Crusader-Zionist-Hindu triumvirate that Osama bin Laden talks about is not the principal villain. In two of the three, a small Muslim minority is being oppressed by other, locally dominant Muslim ethnicities. A notional Kurdistan, with oil-rich Kirkuk as its capital, would be the most pro-West territory in the Middle East after Israel. No wonder it is not bin Laden’s rallying cry.

The Islamists are not the only hypocrites. The US would be happy to have Iranian Balochis demand autonomy but not Pakistani Balochis. Turkey protests against China’s treatment of Turki-speaking Uighurs but is scarcely as generous to Iraqi Kurds, lest it gives Turkey’s own Kurds ideas. China lectures India on Kashmir and America on Iraq. When it comes to Xinjiang, it brutalises its Muslim minority, no questions asked.

Like the Uighurs and the Kurds, the Baloch are the forgotten underdogs of the Muslim world. India should stop pretending they don’t exist.

Ashok Malik is a Delhi-based writer

Ashok Malik
August 02, 2009

Another lie of Rehman Malik exposed

Afghanistan rejects admission of terror camps
Sun, 02 Aug 2009
Afghanistan denies reports that President Hamed Karzai had admitted that his country was home to "terrorist" camps that operate against Pakistan.

Pakistani Interior Minister Rehman Malik said last week that Kabul had admitted that the separatist Baloch youths are being trained on Afghan soil to carry out terrorist attacks inside Pakistan and that President Karzai had promised to take action against these training grounds.

"This is absolutely not true. This is baseless," Afghan Interior Minister Hanif Atmar told a press conference on Sunday adding that after the Pakistani minister expressed Islamabad's deep concerns over the deteriorating security condition in the region, the president had pledged "firm action" against threats to Pakistan from Afghanistan should he receive evidence.

The Afghan minister also rejected his Pakistani counterpart's reported claim that 90 percent of militants arrested in Pakistan were of Afghan origin, saying Kabul had "strong evidence that Afghan as well as Pakistani, Central Asian and Al-Qaeda-linked militants of various nationalities were operating from safe havens across the border."

Malik had also claimed that Indian intelligence agencies were running the anti-Pakistani terrorist camps to cause unrest in Balochistan.

http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=102319§ionid=351020403