KARACHI, July 18: Baloch nationalist leader Abdul Rauf Mengal (MNA) has accused the government of subjecting Baloch people to inhuman treatment, and appealed to the United Nations, European Union and G-8 forums to intervene immediately to get the ‘state-sponsored terrorism’ in Balochistan.
He said that Balochistan these days is faced with the fifth military operation, and claimed that over 6,000 Baloch citizens had so far been killed and 7,000 others had been put behind the bars in the current action. He drew the international community’s attention to the human rights violation where, according to him, a number of people were picked up by agencies and shifted to undisclosed places. Most of them were unaccounted for since they had been picked up months back, he said.
“Today, Balochistan has been turned into a no-go area for journalists, diplomats and human rights activists,” he claimed.
Mr Mengal, who accompanying BNP leaders Mohammad Rafique Bizenjo, Mir Akhtar Hussain Ranga, Mir Mohammad Akbar Mengal and Hameed Sajna, was addressing a press conference at the Karachi Press Club on Tuesday.
In reply to a question, he claimed there existed no government in Balochistan as the province’s affairs were being run by its corps commanders and even, the statements officially attributed to the chief minister were being issued by someone else.
Accusing the government of crossed all limits, he alleged that in Kohlu, Dera Bugti, law-enforcement agencies in Kohlu, Dera Bugti, recently picked up seven people, tied their hands and legs and gunned them down with burst of kalashnikov. He said a video film of the weapons used in the killing was being provided to national and international media.
Mr Mengal told newsmen that even in London, some people belonging to Pakistani agencies had been sent by the Pakistan high commissioner to sabotage a seminar on the operation in Balochistan. “Senator Sanaullah Baloch and Sardar Mumtaz Ali Bhutto have lodged an FIR against the Pakistani High Commissioner and drawn attention of the British government to the regime’s highhandedness.”
He referred to MQM chief Altaf Hussain’s ultimatum to quit the government if operation was not stopped, and said that Baloch people were waiting for the MQM’s move as the operation had rather been intensified.
