Balochistan war, Pakistan accused over 1,000 dumped
bodies
Nearly 1,000 dead bodies of political
activists and suspected armed separatists have been found in Pakistan's restive
Balochistan province over the past six years.
Activists
say the figures, obtained from the human rights ministry by BBC Urdu, point to
large-scale extrajudicial killings.
Relatives
say most victims had been picked up by security agencies.
The
government blames the dumped bodies on infighting among insurgent groups.
Thousands
of people have disappeared without trace in Balochistan since a separatist
insurgency gained momentum in 2007.
A
military-led operation was launched in early 2005 aimed at wiping out the
uprising by ethnic Baloch groups, who are fighting for a greater share of the
province's resources.
According
to the Federal Ministry of Human Rights, at least 936 dead bodies have been
found in Balochistan since 2011.
Most
of them were dumped in the regions of Quetta, Qalat, Khuzdar and Makran - areas
where the separatist insurgency has its roots.
One of
the more prominent cases of "kill-and-dump" is that of Jalil Reki, a
political activist who lived in the Saryab neighbourhood of Quetta.
He was
arrested at his residence in 2009, and his body was found two years later in
the Mand area near the Iranian border, some 1,100km (680 miles) south of
Quetta.
"They
came to our house in three vehicles. These were the vehicles of agencies. They
took away Jalil," his mother told the BBC.
"The
police did not take our report. Our male relatives later approached the then
chief minister's office, but we could not get any response.
"Two
years later some people found his body in Mand. He had one bullet in the head
and three in the chest. His arms were fractured and there were cigarette burns
on his back."
Relatives
of the victims believe the number may be higher.
The
Voice for Baloch Missing Persons (VBMP) says it has recorded 1,200 cases of
dumped bodies and there are many more it has not been able to document.
Nasrullah
Baloch, the head of VBMP, told the BBC most of the bodies "are of those
activists who have been victims of 'enforced disappearances' - people who are
picked up by authorities and then just go missing."
His
allegations chime with an independent Human Rights Commission of Pakistan
(HRCP) report in 2013 that noted "credible reports of continued serious
human rights violations, including [enforced] disappearances of people,
arbitrary arrests, torture and extrajudicial killings".
'Feuds and crime'
Provincial
government spokesman Anwarul Haq Kakar denied that state agencies were involved
in such acts.
"There
are several explanations. Sometimes insurgents are killed in a gunfight with
law enforcement agencies but their bodies are found later," he said.
"Militant
groups also fight among each other and don't bury their dead fighters. Then
there are tribal feuds, organised crime and drug mafia."
There
have been frequent protests by relatives of the victims and Baloch nationalist
organisations over the years, while many have fled to foreign countries or
safer locations within Pakistan.
Naveed
Baloch, who was briefly held by the German police for the 19 December truck
killings in Berlin, left Pakistan in February to "escape persecution"
in his village in Mand region.
An
activist of a nationalist party, he was arrested and tortured by Pakistani
forces in Balochistan last year, and more recently his home in the village was
raided again, his cousin, also called Naveed Baloch, told BBC Urdu.
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