February 09, 2008	Saturday	Safar 01, 1429

LAHORE, Feb 8: The Human Rights Commission of Pakistan on Friday called upon the federal law ministry to move Dr Safdar Sarki, the incarcerated secretary-general of Jeay Sindh Qaumi Mahaz (JSQM), from Zhob to a prison in Sindh and provide him with urgently-needed medical treatment.

In a letter, the commission expressed concern over the risk to the life and health of Dr Sarki on account of his medical condition and his detention in a jail in far-flung and very cold Zhob district of Balochistan.

Dr Sarki is suffering from retinal degeneration (losing eyesight) because of consistent blindfolding, as well as arthritis and hernia. The HRCP urged the government to shift Dr Sarki to his native Sindh province, where the weather is comparatively better.

The organisation demanded that Dr Sarki should also be given regular access to his relatives and colleagues and provided with necessary medicines immediately.

Dr Sarki was taken away by security personnel from a relative’s flat in Karachi on Feb 24, 2006. For a year and a half he remained missing and on the HRCP list of “disappeared” persons before the Supreme Court.

After denying his custody for a long time, the security agencies finally produced Dr Sarki in court in October 2007, along with two other missing Sindhi nationalists. Police then officially “arrested” all the three. Dr Sarki, charged with possessing explosives, was granted bail on Nov 2, 2007, but was never released. —Staff Reporter