June 04, 2008	Wednesday	Jamadi-ul-Awwal 29, 1429

HYDERABAD, June 3: The Baloch Welfare Association on Tuesday appealed for protection to the members of Khoso community of Hatri against police excesses.

Speaking at a news conference at the press club, the chairman of the association, Faqir Altaf Hussain Khoso, and others said that police arrested more than two dozen innocent people of Khoso community on charges of being involved in the kidnapping of Ajab Din Talpur a month ago.

The police also took away 250 goats, buffaloes, cows, a tractor, two motorcycles and other valuable household items of Khoso community to put pressure on them, they alleged.

They said that they were prepared to give whatever guarantees Talpurs demanded and swear on the holy book that Khosos were neither directly nor indirectly involved in Ajab Din’s kidnapping.

They said that they were being threatened to vacate their village, Sharbat Khoso, and appealed to the government and elected representatives to provide them justice. They would stage demonstrations outside the Bilawal House and Chief Minister’s House of they did not get justice, they warned.

To a question, they said that police had released five young boys of Khoso community but 20 others were still in wrongful confinement.