April 24, 2006	Monday	Rabi-ul-Awwal 25, 1427

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QUETTA, April 23: The Pakistan Medical Association (PMA), Balochistan chapter, has announced that doctors will boycott duties in government hospitals and OPDs as well as classes at the Bolan Medical College on Monday to protest against frequent incidents of robbery in their houses.

Addressing a press conference here on Saturday, Balochistan PMA president Dr Naeem Agha threatened that if their demands were not met by Tuesday then all private hospitals, clinics and laboratories in Quetta would be closed.

He said that doctors felt insecure as houses of doctors Hamidullah Bazdar, Sultan Tareen, Irshad, Shahid Khokhar and Ghulam Rasool in the BMC colony had been robbed over the past few days.

Expressing concern over these incidents, he regretted that robbers had struck despite presence of police and check-posts in the colony. In such a situation, he said, it would not be possible for doctors to continue performing their duties.

Dr Naeem pointed out that Dr Hanif Sharif, medical officer of the Kech district, was missing for the past four months. Referring to reports that Dr Sharif had been taken away by an intelligence agency, he said the medical officer should be tried in a court of law if he had committed any crime.

In a humiliating incident, he said, armed men entered the operation theatre in civil hospital and manhandled doctors and threatened that if anything happened to the patient then they would eliminate the surgeon.