'Speak against Pakistan's atrocities and oppression in Balochistan for the sake of humanity'

Balochistan is unknown to the world not because Baloch people are subjected to atrocities since March 27, 1948, when Pakistan forcibly annexed it or that they are not resisting the injustices with the meager resources available to them. It is unknown because the exigencies of the world and the United Nations (UN) do not correspond to the needs of the people being oppressed there.

By Riaz Baloch Balochistan is unknown to the world not because Baloch people are subjected to atrocities since March 27, 1948, when Pakistan forcibly annexed it or that they are not resisting the injustices with the meager resources available to them. It is unknown because the exigencies of the world and the United Nations (UN) do not correspond to the needs of the people being oppressed there.

The Baloch and their struggle have been relegated to obscurity by the world more interested in appeasing dictators and state armies, which are ready to serve the world powers with loyalty and dedication. The world is in the habit of being immune to the pain of people being oppressed by states that pay no heed to human rights.

The UN, which represents the world, also reflects their attitude and hasn't in all these years even tried to make Pakistan comply with conventions on enforced disappearance and torture, it brazenly refuses. This attitude has encouraged Pakistan to flout all laws and norms regarding human rights and civil liberties in Balochistan. The situation in Balochistan is no secret because even the Chief Justice of Pakistan's Supreme Court laments the human rights abuses and extra-judicial killings by the premier intelligence agencies, the Army and the Frontier Corps. He, on record, has blamed them and summoned them to court but the abductions, killings and subsequent dumping have not only continued but increased substantially.

As if to prove their point, these institutions started dumping the brutally tortured bodies of hitherto missing persons since September 10, 2012, with the start of visits by the UN Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances. The Pakistani state wants to ensure that next time around there would be no fact-finding missions here to uncover their atrocities and excesses against the Baloch people. I'm here to highlight the atrocities and excesses that have been committed against Baloch people for the last 72 years. If the world and the UNO continue to ignore the sufferings of the Baloch people, it would tantamount to being complicit in the slow-track genocide being committed in Balochistan by the Pakistani state. The world should awaken to the plight of all the oppressed nationalities being subjected to atrocities and excesses by the majorities or the minorities wielding state power.

The Baloch people have persisted with their struggle for self-determination without external support or for that matter even moral support of the world, which should have by now learned to support the oppressed wherever they may be. We appeal to the conscience of the world to help Baloch get their inalienable right to freedom from Pakistan, for before Balochistan's forcible annexation on 27th March 1948, the Baloch were independent for 227 days. Balochistan, which is hidden from the eyes of the world, is currently suffering from a serious humanitarian crisis. In Pakistan-occupied Balochistan, the Pakistani Army embarrasses humanity.

Pakistan's inhuman atrocities in Balochistan are suppressed because there is a total media blackout. So far the world's longest and most peaceful protest has been going on for more than 10 years in Quetta, Balochistan. It's for those who disappeared because of the Pakistani state agencies and forces, for demanding liberation.

More than 40,000 Baloch political and social activists have been abducted from Balochistan and thousands have been extra-judicially killed in the last 18 years. International human rights organisations are not being given access to the Pakistan-occupied Balochistan and they seem helpless. Our appeal is to the civilised democratic countries: speak against the atrocities and oppression in Balochistan for the sake of humanity.

(Riaz Baloch is a political and human rights activist living in exile in London) (ANI)

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