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By Vivek Sinha
It’s been fourteen years since Baloch student leader Zakir Majeed Baloch was forcibly kidnapped and ‘disappeared’ by the Pakistani security forces. His crime? Well, Zakir Majeed Baloch was well-read and had a thinking mind, which is a big crime in Pakistan-occupied Balochistan (POB). Any Baloch who talks about his rights is conveniently picked up by the Pakistani security forces or their proxies, who then join the long list of ‘missing persons’.
Baloch student leader and former vice chairman of Baloch Student’s Organisation-Azad (BSO-Azad) Zakir Majeed Baloch was born in Khuzdar’s Gazgi village on April 22, 1983. His father’s name is Abdul Majeed Baloch. Zakir Majeed Baloch’s sister Farzana Majeed and his old mother have been struggling for his safe recovery for the last twelve years.
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By Rahul Kumar
Pakistan’s infamous human rights abuse of “enforced disappearances” in conflict-torn Balochistan is also mainstreaming in Punjab province as numerous paramilitary organizations and forces embark on a kidnapping rampage.
In just a few months after the Baloch community protested the State-sponsored kidnapping of Mahal Baloch and the horrors committed against other Baloch women, Pakistani agencies are now using the same tactics against residents of Punjab, the country’s most prosperous and influential area.
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Courtesy : Rozhn TV
Filed under Baloch Vanguards, Interviews and Articles, Video
May 28 is officially a “Day of Greatness” for Pakistan, but for many Balochs it’s a black day.
By Shah Meer Baloch
On May 28 each year, Pakistan proudly celebrates “Youm-e-Takbir,” which translates as the “Day of Greatness,” to commemorate the country’s first successful detonation of nuclear devices. But the locals in Balochistan’s Chagai district, and citizens all across Balochistan, see May 28 as a “black day.”
The locals still suffer as a result of the nuclear explosions the Pakistani government set off in the Ras Koh Mountains 19 years ago. The new generation of Baloch inhabitants in the region is plagued with serious diseases stemming from those blasts. And all in Balochistan are constantly reminded of the promises made at the time by Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif (then serving his second of what would be three terms, spread out over 17 years) to invest in health, education, roads, and infrastructure in the province — promises that have yet to be fulfilled.
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Mujahid Barelvi remembers a forgotten hero of the Baloch struggle. Translated from the Urdu by Babar Mirza
It is a great tragedy for this country in general and Balochistan in particular that Sher Muhammad Marri – who fought an armed struggle in the mountains during the 1950s and ‘60s and was imprisoned in different jails during the ‘70s – is hardly ever remembered in Baloch politics. Even most of the Baloch wouldn’t know where he is buried, for Sher Muhammad Marri was not a sardar or nawab whose politics and legacy had to be kept alive by his sons.
The day my lamenting eyes run out of tears
The eyes of the night of sorrow shall lose all light
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Munaj Gul Muhammad
Sara Baloch* obtained her postgraduate degree in Education seven years ago. Yet, she remains part of the unemployed youth of Balochistan — the largest and most mineral-rich province of Pakistan.
“Despite my Master’s degree, securing a government job in Balochistan is hard,” she says. “That is why I stitch and sell embroidered clothes for extra cash instead of just depending on my parents.”
“My parents were poor but left no stone unturned in sponsoring my education,” she adds. “But graduating with a degree has not eased my troubles. My degree is only a piece of paper, which I filed away years ago. It continues to sit in my drawer.”
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By: Safar Khan Baloch.
Protests continued in Quetta, Karachi, Kech, Khuzdar, Mand and other parts of Balochistan against the enforced disappearances of Baloch women.
New series of these protests are taking place after the enforced disappearances of Baloch women. On February 3, Pakistan Army in collaboration with intelligence agencies forcibly disappeared Rahim Zehri, his mother Mahbas Khatoon, his wife Rasheeda Zehri, and their two children from Gishkori Town in Quetta, the capital city of Balochistan.
In the same fashion, Pakistan Army whisked away Mahal Baloch, her two daughters and other women, and shifted them to an unknown location.
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Two years after international activist Karima Baloch’s death, questions surrounding what happened to her remain.
by Diary Marif
Two years after Karima Mehrab’s body was pulled from Lake Ontario, her friends and fellow human rights activists are still looking for answers about how she died.
Karima, 37, (known here as Karima Baloch as many immigrants from Balochistan use the last name Baloch) was a prominent student organizer who campaigned for Balochistan’s rights and called for justice for the hundreds of students and activists who go missing every year in Pakistan.
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By Himdad Mustafa
Balochis are an ethnic group native to Balochistan, in Southwest Asia. In the last century, with the foundation of modern nation-states, their homeland was occupied and divided between Iran, Afghanistan, and Pakistan. There are no reliable statistics regarding the total number of Baloch people, though in 2013 their population was estimated at around 10 million.[1] Approximately, around 70 percent of the total Baloch population lives in Pakistan-controlled Balochistan, whereas 20 percent inhabits the southeastern Iranian province of Sistan and Baluchestan, and around 10 percent resides in the southern areas of Afghanistan.
Throughout the 20th century and up to today, Balochis have faced systematic discrimination, massacres, and forced resettlement. They have been deprived of their cultural, social, economic, and political rights in their own homeland.[2] After the foundation of the Islamic Republic in 1979, due to their adherence to Sunni Islam, the Balochis in Iran have become subjected to religious discrimination in addition to the existing ethnic discrimination.
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Baluch Sarmachar 