April 27: Shaheed Nazar Jan Mohammadshai

Story of an American Baloch who spent 10 months in ISI dungeons

“What I went through, I won’t wish it for my worst enemy.”

Ahmar Mustikhan

“My personal enmity is only with the ISI,” US Citizen Afzal Bugti, 57, a successful businessman from Chicago, who went back to Pakistan, said. There were rumors that he had been abducted because of personal enmity when he vanished into thin air in May 2016, trackless. Bugti’s cardinal son: talking on the phone with his tribal chief, who is also his party chief, Nawab Brahumdagh Bugti in Geneva.

“I am alive today simply because I am an American,” Bugti said on phone from Karachi. “For 10 long months I did not see the light of the day, when I was freed from the dungeon my eyes could not stand the day’s light.”

How Do You Solve a Problem Like Pakistan?

US patience with Pakistan appears to have finally run out. But whether this will mean Washington will try something different with Pakistan remains to be seen.

Seema Sirohi

Washington: Pakistan and its supporters, increasingly frustrated at the rising crescendo of criticism from US opinion makers and demands for a tougher policy, are trying to make a comeback and rev up their stock by talking up their country’s indispensability for the US.

The objective is to steer the Trump administration’s ongoing policy review in favour of Pakistan to the extent possible and prevent major damage.

April 21: Martyred Grooms of Gwarjak, Balochistan

In the early hours of 21 April 2015 Pakistan army raids the village of Gwarjak in Mahskay Balochistan. Harass and brutally beats up women and children and abduct seven young men including three newly-wed grooms. In the afternoon the Levies Tehseeldar (local police inspector) receives a call from Pakistan Army Camp that they have killed four Baloch rebels in an encounter. So come here and collect the bodies.

In fact all four of them were abducted, extremely tortured and extra-judicially executed in the Pakistan Army Camp. It is note worthy that all four were closely related to Balochistan Liberation Front (BLF) commander Sheh Akhtar Nadeem. Basit Baloch was his brother; Aijaz and Aftab were his cousins as well as brothers in law; Shahnawaz was a close relative. Basit, Aijaz and Shahnawaz were newly-wed grooms.This is how Pakistan Army is committing and justifying Baloch genocide in the enlightened age of 21st Century.

Balochistan’s battle for ideas

Muhammad Akbar Notezai

The buzz about Balochistan in the rest of the country involves China but at a local blood bank in Quetta, jihad in Kashmir and Myanmar takes centre stage. An activist of the Falah-i-Insaniat Foundation (FIF) — the charity wing of the proscribed Jamaat-ud-Daawa (JuD) — is the protagonist, and he is armed with a copy of the paper Ahrar, the JuD’s organ, and other literature propounding jihad.

“You must read these regularly if you want to be good Muslims,” he exhorts others around him. “It will also help you live your lives according to the sunnah.”

کراچی میں بلوچ نسل کشی

عادل بلوچ

تاریخ کے اوراق میں کلاچی سے کراچی تک کا سفر کڑوا حقیقت ہونے کے ساتھ دردناک بھی ہے ۔ بلوچ جغرافیائی حدود ، تاریخی ورثہ ، زبان ، ثقافت پر یلغار سے کلاچی کا کراچی میں تبدیل ہونا ایک طویل بحث کا متقاضی ہے۔ میرا اپنے اس مختصر کالم میں، اس طویل کہانی کو زیر بحث لائے بغیر یہاں کے بلوچوں کی موجودہ حالتِ زندگی کے ہزاروں مشکلات میں سے صرف ایک ’’بلوچ نسل کشی‘ کو زیر بحث لانے کا مقصد گذشتہ کئی سالوں سے جاری بلوچ نسل کشی کے طویل منصوبے اور بحثیت مجموعی اپنی بے حسی کو خود پر آشکار کرنا ہے۔

ہر دورمیں مشکلات و مصائب کے باجود کراچی بلوچوں کی سیاسی ، سماجی ، ادبی سرگرمیوں کا مرکز رہا ہے ۔ بلوچوں کی سب سے زیادہ آبادی والا شہر ہونے کے سبب بلوچ قومی تحریک میں کراچی کا ایک فعال کردار رہا ہے ،اور یہی سیاسی جدوجہد ریاست کیلئے دردِ سر تھی جبکہ ریاست کی ہمیشہ کو شش تھی کہ بلوچ قومی تحریک کے حوالے سے کراچی میں سیاسی خلا ء پیدا کیا جائے ۔

A slow motion Chernobyl disaster

Mir Mohammad Ali Talpur

Coal is an unforgiving servant as it exacts its proverbial ‘pound of flesh’ from its masters.

To begin with, mined coal needs to be washed of impurities which produce a fantastic amount of coal sludge (slurry) that in turn needs a dam for storage. This sludge contains mercury, arsenic, beryllium, cadmium, nickel and selenium, all harmful for people and ecology. Little wonder that people affected by the dam now being established near Ghorano village in Thar are vehemently but futilely protesting.

April 13: Rasool Jan Baloch and The Martyrs of Gibun Turbat

April 03: Martyrs of Murghaap