August 18, 2007	Saturday	Sha’aban 4, 1428

LAHORE, Aug 17: The Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP) has expressed concern over the “continuous targeting” of the Bugti tribe and appealed to parliamentarians to raise the issue in parliament to end “physical abuse” of the tribe by government forces.

HRCP Chairperson Asma Jahangir said in a press statement here on Friday that people belonging to the Bugti tribe had told the commission’s Karachi office “harrowing tales of their persecution by the Frontier Constabulary and its puppet tribes”. They said that their persecution had forced them to leave their homes in Dera Bugti.

People sympathetic to Baloch chieftain Nawab Akbar Bugti are being targeted and thousands of them are migrating to safer places, Ms Jahangir quoted Bugti men and women as saying. She said that around 500 men, women and children belonging to Sangsilla town of the Bugti area recently left the town and walked for several hours to safety. They told HRCP about children dying of hunger and people being shot dead and kidnapped by people being patronised by government forces.