Balochistan: 27 disappeared, 39 killed in October 2021 — HRCB report

A rights group from Balochistan, Human Rights Council of Balochistan (HRCB) has released its monthly report. In the report the HRCB has covered the human rights abuses occurred in Balochistan, in the month of October 2021.

In the month of October 2021, according to HRCB, it has received reports of enforced disappearance of at least 27 people, who were abducted by security forces from different areas of Balochistan. The abductees include people as old as 76 and as young as 6 years old.

Moreover, at least 39 people were extrajudicially killed during the month. Three children were killed by the military forces  while the police’s Counter-Terrorism Department killed nine in fake encounter. The number of people killed by the CTD this year has reached 39, fourteen of whom identified so far were registered as victims of enforced disappearance and had already been in the custody of forces. In addition, Baloch nationalist militants claimed to kill three people including a journalist in October, the report read.

Meanwhile, Nasrullah, a resident of Nokjo Mashkay district Awaran who had been abducted by the forces 12 years ago, was released. Nasrullah has lost his memory and does not remember anything from his past. His body bears multiple signs of torture. After circulation of his picture on social media, Nasrullah’s brother identified him from a sign on his head.

Disappearances:

According to the details, the security forces whisked away a student Shah Mir on June 21 and his cousin Murtaza on September 22. Both Shah Mir and Murtaza are brothers and cousins of student leader Dr Sabiha Baloch, the chairperson of the Baloch Student Action Committee (BSAC), an organization campaigns for students’ rights.

Moreover, Murtaza had been detained and tortured for months in the past too. He was abducted in 2009 for the first time and kept in a dungeon for two months without any charges against him. The second time he was taken away was September 9, 2021, and was later released on September 17, 2021.

On October 18, the security forces raided the house of Darey Khan in the Toba, Gichk area of district Washuk and whisked away his two minor grandchildren, ten-year-old Sanam Jameel and her six-year-old brother Gazzain Jameel. Darey Khan himself was summoned to a military camp a month ago, where he was detained and kept incommunicado and had not returned to his family. Daray Khan and his grandchildren remain missing at the time of writing this report.

On October 26, Ali Jan son of Noor Mohammad, a resident of Kharan, who is a vegetable seller and a football player, was forcibly disappeared for the third time by the military. He was first abducted from an FC check post in the Ahmedwal area of Noshki in 2018 and reappeared two months later. For the second time, on 10 May 2020, FC and MI personnel detained him from Kharan. Five months later, he was handed over to the Noshki police without any explanation from where he was then released. This time he was detained by the CTD from a bus stand at Kharan Bazaar and shifted to undisclosed location.

The family of Ali Jan is worried about his safety as they have already received the body of his disappeared cousin, killed by the CTD in a fake encounter in July 2021. Qudratullah Baloch, a cousing of Ali Jan, was gunned down by the CTD along with four other victims of enforced disappearance. Qudratullah Baloch had been abducted and disappeared by the security forces during a raid on March 23, 2021 and kept in incommunicado detention for three months before being handed over to the CTD.

On October 04, Pakistan’s security forces detained a Balochi Poet, Azhar Noor son of Kuhda Bakhsh, from Pasni, a coastal area of district Gwadar.

On October 06, security personnel broke into a house in Faqir Colony in Gwadar and abducted a young man named Saleem. The victim is an internally displaced person. His family has moved from Dasht Tangi to Gwadar town because of the military operations in the rural areas.

The military forcibly disappeared Tariq son of Nizamuddin, from the Shashan Hotel in Khuzdar district on the same day, October 06. The victim is a professional cricket player at Shashan Cricket Club in Khuzdar.

On October 08, Salah son of Amiran Domki, a resident of Dera Murad Jamali, was forcibly disappeared by personnel of intelligence agencies. The abductors were in plainclothes in a vehicle and took the victim from the Main Bazaar of the district.

On October 09, the security forces raided a house in Kharan city and took away Lutfullah son of Babu Ismail. The man has a stall in the main bazar where he sold snacks to meet daily needs of his family.

In another raid on October 09, security forces besieged a house in Kotan area of Sar Kharan and whisked away three brothers. The forces brutally tortured all three of them in front of their family before whisking them away. Five days later, two of them were released, but the whereabouts of Faqeer Karim Bakhsh remain unknown. Meanwhile, another person Saddam Qadir Dad was detained during a military raid in the Kili Dino area of district Kharan.

On October 16, the military forcibly disappeared Majid son of Qadir Dad from Dasht Balnigwar of Kech district when the victim was collecting wood, a profession majority of the people in the area rely on.

On October 22, in Kahan Pakistani forces cordoned off the area and forcibly disappeared five people. Three of them, Babu, Beida and Wadu, were brothers while the other two have not been identified yet. The victims were livestock breeders.

On October 25, Aleem Machi, a resident of the Bakhtiarabad area of Sibi district, was detained by security forces and transferred to an unknown location. Since then his whereabouts are unknown.

On October 29, Pakistani forces detained Mulla Bashir’s son Haji Ghulam Qadir and Javed son of Allah Bakhsh, residents of Dasht Korostank. The victims were on their way home from Kashap when the military took them into custody.

On October 30, personnel of the military and intelligence agencies abducted four members of a family from the Mangchar area of Quetta district. Dost Mohammad and Hamza were brothers from the Sariab, Kili Sarde area of Quetta. Dost Mohammad works at a gas company, while Hamza was a rickshaw driver. Meanwhile, two other brothers and relatives of Dost Mohammed and Hamza, Saadullah and Mohammad Ali, were also taken away and forcibly disappeared. Saadullah is a mechanic and Mohammad Ali was making a living by driving a water tanker.

On October 31, Pakistani military and intelligence agencies raided a house in the Khudabadan area of Panjgur at around 1:00 am and abducted and disappeared Masood son of Maqbool Ahmed.

Killings:

On October 02, the CTD raided on Baloch Student Organization’s chairman Zarif Rind’s house and shot dead his 10-year-old nephew Ramiz and injured 7-year-old Rayan. The officials also arrested his brother Khalil Rind, father of the slain child during the raid.

In addition, on October 10, a seven-year-old girl, Sharatoon, and her brother, five-year-old Allah Bakhsh, were killed and another child Miskan Wazir was injured in a mortar shelling incident by Pakistani security forces in the Hoshab area of Kech district. The kids were playing in their house’s backyard when the FC’s mortar landed near them. The girl died on the spot while her brother succumbed to the injuries in the hospital later that day. However, Miskan Wazir is still under treatment with severe injuries.

The two siblings are the tenth and eleventh members of the family killed by the forces. In 2014, seven military helicopters bombarded and burnt down their house in Hajiabad area of Keelkore. Two of their children were killed and three members of the family were injured. One of the injured children lost his leg and is a handicap now. The family left their homes and migrated to Murad Bakhsh village, another village in the region, but on 20 December 2020, the forces once again attacked their new settlements, in Murad Bakhsh village. This time the forces burned down their huts and killed seven members of the family including a minor Hamza Omar and Murad Muhammad Miskaan, the father of Miskan Wazir, the boy injured in Hoshap mortar attack. 

The family once again left the village and settled in Hoshap a few months ago to live a safer life but the forces killed the children even there.

Moreover, on October 02, unknown gunmen shot dead a doctor Sher Muhammad Sheikh Mengal in Wadh area of Khuzdar. The incident took place when the doctor was on his way to the bazaar from his house after the gunmen opened fire on him, killing him on the spot.

On October 07, Muhammad Akhtar son of Muhammad Iqbal, a resident of Dhadar, was shot dead in a firing incident by unidentified gunmen near Sibi Road in Quetta. No arrest has been made so far.

On October 10, Shahid Zehri, a journalist of a private news TV channel, was killed in a car bomb blast near the city police station in the industrial city of Hub. A Baloch militant organization, the Baloch Liberation Army, took responsibility, accusing him of being an informer and secret agent of the Pakistan army and intelligence agencies. The BLA also blamed him for being involved in the supply of drugs from Karachi, doing business with criminal gangs, and sexually abusing innocent minors, among other crimes.

On October 11, Khudabakhsh was killed and his accomplice Ghulam Mustafa was injured by gunmen near Sariab Mill in Quetta. On the same day, four people were killed during a clash between the Pakistani military and militants in the Madag Kaor area of Kolwah, district Awaran. The deceased were identified as Asadullah, Aqil, Sakhi Bakhsh and Pervaiz. A Baloch militant organization, the Balochistan Liberation Front (BLF), issued a statement saying that they were its members.

On October 22, the CTD spokesperson said that the force conducted an operation in the Roshi area of Mastung and killed nine people allegedly in an exchange of fire. One of the slain ‘terrorists’ was identified as Yar Mohammad, a person the forces had forcibly disappeared earlier. Yar Muhammad son of Dada Khan was a resident of Marwar who had moved with his family to Quetta, due to continuous military operations in his hometown. He was forcibly disappeared from the Hazar Ganji area of Quetta in March 2016 and had remain missing since then. The rest of the victims have not been identified yet.

On October 23, six other people were killed in a clash between armed men and the military in the Jamro area of Harnai. Four of them were identified as Tariq Marri, Muhammad Hussain Marri, Bakhtiar Sumalani and Saifullah Zehri. The Baloch Liberation Army claimed that they were its members. However, two civilians also died from forces’ shooting. They were identified as Juma Khan, son of Ali Murad, and Mahmood, son of Shahu of Talib Area Nasik, Harnai, who were local shepherds.

On October 26, a young man named Sohail was killed by unidentified gunmen in the Buleda area of Kech district. The Pakistan military had previously abducted the victim in May 2016. He was kept in illegal custody and tortured for almost four years and later released on January 16, 2020. After his release, he remained vocal about his experience during the detention, an unusual approach by torture victims and had his testimony in the disappearance case of missing student leader Shabir Baloch. He claimed that they were kept in the same cell for 4 months before he was released. Shabir, a human rights and student leader, was abducted and forcibly disappeared in 2016 and his whereabouts are still unknown. However, no investigation has been conducted to ascertain the facts and arrest those responsible for his abduction.

On October 31, two civilians were killed and three FC personnel were injured when an explosive device planted on a motorcycle exploded near a Pakistan military vehicle in the main bazaar of Panjgur. The victims’ bodies were shifted to Civil Hospital Panjgur, one of whom was identified as Noorullah, a resident of Panjgur.