Balochistan: Denying of Enforced Disappearances in Balochistan is not the solution. BHRO & VBMP

Baloch Human Rights Organization and Voice for Baloch Missing Persons’ activists jointly held a press conference in Quetta Press Club about the statement of Justice (R) Javed Iqbal, head of the commission of human rights formed by Senate, on enforced disappearances in Balochistan. Talking to the journalists in the press club, Mama Qadeer said that in world’s history, there is no such example that denying and hiding an issue had solved or decreased the intensity of a problem but on the contrary, denying the very nature of the problem will raise the problem with greater intensity.  In the same way denying the human rights violations in Balochistan is equivalent to bringing intensity to the issue. In Balochistan, from last many decades, not a single field of life is safe and the state’s institution that is responsible for the protection of human life and rights are dealing the issues with a very non-serious approach and worsening the issue. Justice (R) Javed Iqbal, Chairman of commission for missing persons, during the conference of human rights committee, formed by the Senate, said that the list of enforced disappeared persons of Balochistan is not based on truth. This statement is the continuity of stubbornness. The aforementioned committee, in last six years, couldn’t present its initial report so far which shows the non-seriousness of the committee towards the issue of enforced disappearance. The statement of commission’s head is, in fact, the government stance which is being continuously repeated.

He said that the statement of Chairman of the committee of enforced disappeared persons will be the cause of bringing more intensity in the problem of enforced disappearances in Balochistan. Whereas the issue of human rights violations including the enforced disappearances in Balochistan has become too serious that all the international human rights institutions have already shown their concerns regarding this situation but the commission of enforced disappearances of Pakistan, either don’t have the knowledge of this serious issue or trying to deny it intentionally. The Chairman of the committee of human rights during the conference has said that the organizations, who claimed that the citizens are being forcefully disappeared, couldn’t present any list. In fact, this stance is the denial of the very existence of the problem of enforced disappearances while the commission itself never bothered to meet the families of the victims or listen to their views nor have they approached any human rights organizations of Balochistan. However, human rights organizations have tried to approach the commission several times but the commission didn’t meet them. The basic details including the names of enforced disappeared people along with their residential addresses are available on the website of Baloch Human Rights Organization.

Our organization is active about the human right in Balochistan and with limited resources we are trying to reach all the areas of Balochistan, whereas, the missing persons’ commission is limited to Quetta city and is unaware of the issues of Balochistan.  As far as the list is concern, we want to make it very clear that our organization is publishing monthly and yearly reports of human rights violations in Balochistan and list of enforced disappeared and extrajudicially executed persons regularly and sending them to different human rights organizations. Other than this, Voice for Baloch Missing Persons also publishes reports on enforced disappearances but the commission never showed its attention toward this.

The provincial government has claimed to arrest 12000 people on the basis of suspicion in between 2015 to 2016Senatebut it is still unknown in what condition they are. The real situation of Balochistan is this that the security forces instead of producing the enforced disappeared people in court, are trailing them behind closed doors and after years of illegal detention and inhumane torture they will be either released or their mutilated bodies will be recovered but it is very saddening that the Chairman of commission of human rights neither met the families of disappeared persons himself nor any of his representative felt the necessity of doing so.

Mama Qadeer Baloch said that through this conference we invite the commission to meet the families of disappeared people in Balochistan and we are ready to give them the list of enforced disappeared people. If the commission is serious about solving the issue of enforced disappearances in Balochistan than instead of being present as a formality during the hearing of enforced disappeared persons in Balochistan High Court, should hear and address all the families seriously and report against the responsible institutions to Senate.

Human Rights Council of Balochistan (Hakkpaan) is a non-profit and non-partisan human rights group based in Balochistan and Sweden. It collects reports from Balochistan, a region Pakistan government does not allow any media and HR group to visit and report. Human rights violations in Balochistan is not a new phenomenon, but it got its worst levels after the Military coup de tat of Pakistan in 1999. Thousands of Baloch have been reported missing, hundreds killed in fake encounters and so-called kill and dump policy of the military. HRCB collects the data from Balochistan itself, through its network of volunteers and supporters, organizes and reports them to the human rights mechanisms of the world.