KARACHI, April 6: Balochistan National Party leaders have apprehended that the two guards and a driver of Sardar Akhtar Mengal might be killed in custody. The three persons were arrested by security agencies on Wednesday night.

MNA Abdul Rauf Mengal and MPAs Akbar Mengal and Mir Akhtar Lango told a press conference here on Thursday the guards Mehboob Ali and Nasrullah, and the driver, Ghulam Haider, had been handed over to the DIG (Operations) on Wednesday.

They said the BNP chief, Sardar Mengal, was informed by the DIG that an FIR had been registered against them at Darakhshan police station and they would be given in police custody. However, they wondered, they could not find the three persons in police custody when they visited the concerned police station to seek a copy of the FIR. “The police told us that neither the three persons were in their custody nor was any FIR registered against them at this police station.”

The BNP leaders said that the guards and driver seemed to have been taken to some unknown place for grilling.

“This is a matter of a great concern to us as many Baloch activists picked up by agencies earlier had been killed and even their bodies had not been handed over to their relatives,” they said.

Rauf Mengal claimed that as many as 8,000 Baloch people were in the custody of government agencies and 600 of them had been killed.

They pointed out that in the days the military operation was launched in Balochistan, the agencies had kidnapped Asadullah Mengal, son of Sardar Ataullah Mengal. Asadullah was later killed and his body has not yet been handed over to the bereaved family.

The United Nations and other international bodies, including Human Rights Commission, should take notice of the atrocities in Balochistan. They observed that the country was being ruled by secret agencies which were violating human rights and depriving the smaller provinces of their legitimate rights.

Meanwhile, senators Shahid Bugti and Rauf Baloch from Balochistan, have condemned the security forces for laying a siege of Sardar Mengal’s residence on Wednesday, and accused the government of consistently pursuing a policy of confrontation Balochistan.

They claimed that the Wednesday incident was a proof of the government’s intention to drag the Baloch people into a showdown for which, they added, it had now started an all-out war against them.

Describing the siege as a ‘highly provocative act’, Senator Shahid Bugti said the purpose of such acts was to create a justification for an extreme action against Baloch people, even those who were holding peaceful protests against the rulers’ anti-Baloch policies.

He warned that such repressive methods would create bitterness against the armed forces and would have a negative impact on the country’s integrity.

Senator Rauf Baloch said that freedom of movement and privacy had been guaranteed under the human rights charter and the country’s constitution. No civilized government could deprive its citizens of this right. He lambasted the rulers for violating all provisions of the laws on basic human rights.

“We will never comprise on our national rights and will continue our struggle for national rights,” he declared.