VIEW: Who to blame for ethnic persecution of Hazaras? —Liaquat Ali Hazara

Government of Pakistan must also be pressured to the extent of taking reasonable steps against the terrorists, executing targeted operations in the areas of Quetta in which attacks have occurred frequently

The incessant targeted attacks on the peaceful denizens of Quetta city have mostly hit the Hazaras who have lived there for centuries. Numerous authors, writers, intellectuals and columnists analyse the ethno-religious killings of this under-represented and oppressed ethnic group based on reviews and published articles, but I will try to look into it from a different perspective as I hail from the same ethnicity and city.

On various occasions, I have seen terrorists perpetrating acts of targeted attacks and then leaving the scene without fear of being caught by the law enforcement agencies. For instance, the incident of June 8, 2003 when 13 Hazara police cadets were gunned down on Sariab Road, Quetta in broad daylight, which left seven others critically wounded. In less than a month, the terrorists broke into the Grand Mosque on Prince Road, known as Imam Bargah Hazara Kalan, to wreck the Friday congregation prayers with suicide bombing and fierce firing on worshippers, killing about 67 people and injuring about 70 others. The third major attack happened on March 2, 2004 when terrorists targeted the annual Ashura procession in Liaquat Bazar with hand grenades and AK-47s, killing 45 and injuring 100 people. The third orchestrated attack could not have happened without the support of the intelligence agencies of Pakistan as all entry and exit routes around Quetta city were sealed off by the law enforcement agencies three days prior to the main procession. All adjacent hotels, restaurants and inns were being checked several times a day to ensure security measures are in place. Thousands of paramilitary troops and police were deployed with barbed wire, blockades and obstacles blocking the important routes to avoid any untoward situation. Nonetheless, the terrorists successfully struck the heart of the procession with hand grenades and automatic weapons to murder innocent people. The firing of terrorists, in the third instance, did not kill as many people as the targeted firing of the anti-terrorist force (ATF) — the elite commando group to combat terrorism — killed innocent people. For obvious reasons, the fire orders could not have been executed without the instructions of their superiors. Government immediately announced to probe the Ashura carnage under a serving high court judge, which took months of inquest to complete but without bearing fruit as the report was never made public. I later learned through some well-placed friends that the judgment too was implicated as it blamed the mourners for the mass human loss.

In the above mentioned first and second example, I was not at the scene of the crime but I reached about half an hour after the incidents, among mayhem, to shift the dead bodies and the injured to the Sandeman Provincial Hospital, who were later referred to the Cantonment Military Hospital for better care and treatment. In the third instance, I was literally at a distance of 10 metres from the main scene of the crime when terrorists were firing at people. Fortunately, my friend and I were standing in the opposite direction of the culprits’ firing and due to restricted hand movement, they were unable to fire in our direction. Later that day, I witnessed how the members of the ATF were shooting at the protesters from armoured vehicles and many succumbed to their injuries instantly. Shahbaz Mandokhail was the superintendent of police (ATF), but no government official was ever investigated or held responsible for the killings of those innocent people.

Since then, the perpetual targeted killings of the Hazaras have touched new heights with new tactics and a renewed gusto from the terrorists. The number of death casualties for this oppressed ethnicity has crossed the figure of 700, with double this number injured. Most of them are paralysed for life, due to unaffordability of medical bills by the victims and their families. 

Then another tragic incident occurred in the heart of Quetta city, which killed six innocent Hazaras and several others were critically injured. Reliable sources have confirmed that the terrorists came on two motorcycles and fired on a shoe shop to target the Hazaras.

In three weeks in just the month of March, Hazaras were attacked four times in different areas of Quetta city. A simple arithmetical calculation reveals that it comes to burying one person a day. Most of the human loss consists of young adults whose estimated age is18-25.

The Pakistani media is deliberately silent, mostly, about these atrocities. The federal government, including the president and the former prime minister of Pakistan, were content with verbal consolation to the victims’ families and condemned these incidents, without any directives to arrest the perpetrators.

The Balochistan Chief Minister, Aslam Raisani, who hits headlines with his preposterous statements about the loss of Hazaras’ lives, spends most of his time in the capital Islamabad, which evidently depicts his interests in running the affairs of the province. Instead of seeking an amicable solution to these problems, he was quoted as saying last September that he would send a truckload of tissue paper for the victims and their families and that killing of some people would not affect the overall population of the province. 

These religious fanatics were produced under the patronage of the Pakistani intelligence agencies, with financial support of some Arab countries, including Saudi Arabia. In a terrorist attack that targeted a moving Suzuki pick-up van on Spini Road, Quetta, on March 29, 2012, the police check post was literally at a distance of 15 metres from the main scene of the crime. This check post is manned 24 hours a day but the security personnel turned a blind eye to the scene. Had they counter-fired on the terrorists, they could have thwarted their plan to kill innocent people.

The provincial government claimed to have deployed about 3,000 paramilitary troops and police in Quetta city but they could not stop these heinous attacks. The provincial Interior Minister Mir Zafarullah Zehri spoke in TV interviews, numerous times, about the involvement of provincial ministers in these targeted killings and kidnappings of innocent city dwellers, but still the government and the judiciary showed passiveness to take any action against the culprits and their supporters.

It is high time Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch and other human rights organisations as well as the international community exerted meaningful pressure on the government of Pakistan to protect the lives of minorities. Government of Pakistan must also be pressured to the extent of taking reasonable steps against the terrorists, executing targeted operations in the areas of Quetta in which attacks have occurred frequently.

The writer is a London-based freelance journalist and the Chairman of Hazara United Movement (HUM) — a political organisation working for the rights of the Hazara Diaspora with its head office in London

Daily Times 

Afghanistan's Hazara Minority Outraged By Science Academy Insults

A Hazara laborer poses in Kabul's old quarter. Hazaras are generally considered to comprise the third-largest ethnic group in Afghanistan, together with Uzbeks.

By Abubakar Siddique

July 03, 2012
Documenting Afghanistan's diverse ethnic makeup would seem like an innocent enough endeavor, but a recent attempt has left a team of academics facing possible criminal charges.

The source of the problem is the innocuously named "Ethnographic Atlas of Non-Pashtun Ethnic Groups of Afghanistan," published in June by the government-appointed Academy of Sciences Afghanistan.

Certain passages have Afghanistan's Hazara minority seeing red.

"The Hazaras are liars, dishonest, and unreliable people," reads one passage cited by the "Daily Outlook Afghanistan" newspaper. "Bodies of their women are hairless except on the head. The Hazaras are the sons of Mongol Khans living in the mountains of Afghanistan. These people [know] nothing except fighting."

The newspaper goes on to report that the book, which RFE/RL was unable to independently obtain, describes the Hazaras as "rafizi" -- worse than infidels.

The resulting outcry from Hazara politicians was enough to prompt President Hamid Karzai to step in. In mid-June, Karzai banned the atlas, dismissed four academics from the Academy of Sciences, and ordered an investigation into their reasons for publishing the comments.

The four now face possible criminal charges for stoking ethnic tensions, pending the findings of a lengthy questionnaire they have been asked to fill out.

'Face The Force Of Law'

Deputy Attorney General Enayatullah Kamal, who is overseeing the investigation, has said that if it is determined that the insults were intentional, the academics will have to answer for their actions.

"Fanning differences among the ethnic groups of Afghanistan is forbidden," Kamal said. "Anybody violating this has to face the force of law."

Karzai has described the contents of the book as "grossly offensive" and "an insult to all the resident ethnicities and thus the entire Afghan population."

Sayed Amin Mujahid, the author of the atlas, has defended the book, in part by claiming that most of the contested passages were based on the writings of a Hazara historian, Fayz Muhammad Kateb.

Mujahid says everything he wrote was clearly referenced and that the contents are being distorted for political reasons.

"An academic and scholarly issue has now being turned into a political one," he says. "I am saying this because in cases people are only told about the first half of a sentence, but they are being kept away from the second half."

'Lowball' Estimates

The Academy of Sciences Afghanistan is no stranger to controversy when it comes to the Hazaras. In late 2011, leaders of the predominantly Shi'a-minority group took umbrage at what they considered lowball estimates of the Hazara population that were contained in an almanac published by the academy.

An academic and scholarly issue has now being turned into a political one.
Sayed Amin Mujahid
The reference listed the Hazaras as making up 9 percent of Afghanistan's estimated population of 26 million. They claimed the figures were heavily biased in favor of the Pashtuns, who were listed as comprising 60 percent of the population.

Hazara politicians widely cite the figure of 20 percent in estimating the minority's share of Afghanistan's population.

Exact figures are unavailable, largely due to the fact that no accurate census has ever been taken in Afghanistan. The last attempt, in the late 1970s, was never completed. Calls for a new census following decades of war have never been realized.

Generally accepted figures cited in UN documents and by other international bodies list the Pashtun population at just over 40 percent, followed by Tajiks at less than 30 percent, and Hazaras and Uzbeks at around 10 percent. Various smaller minorities account for the rest of the population.

Such statistics are an important issue among minorities, who can use greater numbers to argue for greater political influence. Observers say politicians commonly exaggerate the population of their tribes or ethnic groups.

Hussain Yasa, a Hazara and editor of the "Daily Outlook Afghanistan" in Kabul, says the latest controversy does not augur well for the future of a country preparing to maintain security on its own.

He says it will not be easy to end discord over Afghanistan's ethnic makeup but that a comprehensive population census would be a good place to start.

"This is not only about which community is larger than the other community," Yasa says. "The census is one of the very important things for our development and even for our security."


With contributions from RFE/RL's Radio Free Afghanistan

Radio Free Europe

استاد محقق

Ban imposed on Iran-bound bus service

Tuesday, July 03, 2012
From Print Edition

QUETTA: The district administration Quetta on Monday imposed a ban on operation of bus service from Quetta for Iran via Taftan border gate.

Official sources said that bus service operating between Quetta and border town of Taftan for providing travelling service to passengers and pilgrims who want to visit Iran has been asked to stop their service with immediate effect.

The district administration issued the orders after a series of attacks including bomb blasts and firing on buses.The district administration sources further said that the said bus service would be restored after improvement in law and order situation.

The News

France 24; Pakistani extremists film massacre of Shiite minority group

02/07/2012 / PAKISTAN

Pakistan’s Hazara population, a predominantly Shiite Muslim ethnic minority, has long been subjected to persecution, and in recent months, increasing violence. Yet in a disturbing new trend, members of the Sunni extremist group Lashkar-e-Jhangvi, which has claimed responsibility for several attacks targeting the country’s Hazara, have begun filming deadly assaults on the community and posting the videos online.

Filmed just outside of Quetta, the capital of Pakistan’s western Balochistan province and home to a large Hazara community, the video below contains graphic images. A number of Hazara fruit and vegetable sellers were en route to Quetta from a suburb dubbed “Hazara Town” on October 4, when the bus they were travelling on was forced to stop by a group of armed men. Aiming their weapons into the vehicle, the assailants killed 13 of the passengers in cold blood.

The incident was reported by local media, and Lashkar-e-Jhangvi, which has ties to both al Qaeda and the Taliban, came forward to claim responsibility for the massacre. Footage of the attack later surfaced on the Internet.

WARNING: THIS VIDEO CONTAINS DISTURBING IMAGES

Though the video is several months old, it is representative of the kind of deadly violence that has become increasingly commonplace in the region. The last known attack happened on June 28, when a car bomb struck a bus carrying a group of Hazara on a road near Quetta. Thirteen people were killed and 25 others injured. The next day, members of the city’s Hazara community staged a demonstration to protest against the bloodshed.

According to Abdul Qayuum Changezi, head of the organisation Hazara Jarga, approximately 60 Hazaras have been killed since January alone, while more than 600 have been killed since 2000.

In addition to the threat of deadly violence, Pakistan’s Hazara population are also faced with persecution, and are regularly targeted by Sunni extremists who settled in Balochistan, which lies near the border with Afghanistan, after the fall of the Taliban in 2001.

CONTRIBUTORS

Hamza qasimi

“We’re an easily recognisable target for terrorists, because we look like Mongolians”

Hamza Qasimi, a Hazara, lives in Quetta. In the video, the terrorists are speaking in Baravi, a local Balochistan dialect. They are shouting ‘Kafir, Kafir!’ which means ‘non-Muslim’. To them, we are infidels. It’s not the first time that the Taliban have filmed themselves executing members of my community. Other videos are circulating on the Internet, often set to Taliban chants. To them, killing Hazaras is a demonstration of power, and a source of pride.

Video of an attack targeting Hazaras in September, 2011. In it, Taliban chants can be heard. 

We’re an easily recognisable target for terrorists because we look like Mongolians. Sometimes, they hunt us down in our stores in Quetta. My father had a shop near the central marketplace but he decided to leave town, it had become too dangerous to live here.

Hamza qasimi

This article was written with FRANCE 24 journalist Peggy Bruguière. 

Rebuilding smiles

By LIM WEY WEN
star2@thestar.com.my

On the barren mountains of Bamyan, Afghanistan, Malaysian troops employ creative approaches to help the community improve their health and quality of life.

WINTER was approaching at the central Afghanistan province of Bamyan when the third Malaysian Contingent for International Security Assistance Forces (Malcon 3 ISAF) arrived at the Kiwi Base in October.

However, the harsh weather conditions and subzero temperatures were only the first of a long list of challenges the teams faced in the poorest province in the war-torn country.
Oral help: Besides providing dental services, the Malaysian team in Afghanistan also offered a course to train Afghan students in basic dental techniques. In this photo, Malcon 3 ISAF dental officer Kapten Dr Naili Hayati Abd Mukti (centre) supervises two of her students while they treat a local in Bamyan. — Photos by Malcon 3 ISAF

The mountainous terrain, isolated villages scattered across them at more than 2,400m above sea level, and barren soil with no trees in sight were also daily obstacles to grapple with.

“We felt very sad because although we are living (in the 21st century), there are still people living in caves,” says Lt Kolonel Nordin Mohd Yusof, head of the Malcon 3 ISAF team who had returned from the mission in April. He and his team members shared their experiences with us recently in Kuala Lumpur.

“There is no electricity or water. People have to get water from the rivers or wells, some electricity comes from solar panels (supplied by international missions like Malaysia’s), and light from lamps using kerosene or whatever oil they make locally,” Nordin says.

Nordin led a team of 40 staff members to continue Malcon-ISAF missions in several districts of the Bamyan province, including the capital, Bamiyan, and rural districts such as Yakawlang, Wasar, and Panjab.

His team, which was the third deployment on a six-month rotation from Malaysia, comprised officers and enlisted personnel from the Royal Medical and Dental Corp, as well as administrative and security personnel from the Malaysian Armed Forces.

“Our mission is to provide humanitarian assistance to the people of Bamyan so that they will be able to reconstruct the province,” explains Nordin, adding that “we are focusing more on capacity building.”
With female officers in its ranks, the Malcon 3 ISAF team managed to promote family spacing among Afghans who are generally very resistant to family planning. Soon, people began approaching Kapten Dr Nor Azima h Zakaria (in uniform, above) for advice as well as listening to her speak on national radio (left) in the country’s national language, Dari.

While the previous Malcon-ISAF teams focused on providing medical assistance, Nordin’s team has expanded Malaysia’s assistance to helping the community achieve some form of clinical governance, where systematic programmes are devised to help healthcare professionals in the province better care for their own people.

Together with dental surgeon Kolonel Dr Kamal Abdullah, senior medical officer Mejar Dr Mohd Zaki Mokhtar, and Kapten Dr Nor Azimah Zakaria, who led the dental, medical and health promotion teams respectively, Nordin worked with the Afghanistan Ministry of Public Health (MOPH) to come up with innovative programmes to help the people of Bamyan gain access to clean water, an uninterrupted power supply, better oral care, and access to information on family planning.

“We do not want to implement just any programme that we bring from Malaysia. We want it to be led by the (Afghan) people for the people,” says Dr Zaki.

Clean water
By distributing toothbrushes and toothpaste to schools and orphanages, the team hopes to start young Afghans on the road to better oral health.

One of the first programmes the Malcon-ISAF team discussed with the MOPH was to introduce a water filtration system that is made locally from materials that can be found in the region.

Although there are NGOs helping to dig wells and provide containers to collect water, Dr Zaki says the need for the people to have a sustainable way of accessing clean and safe drinking water still remains.

“We are not the first to introduce a water filtration system there – organisations like the WHO (World Health Organisation), Unicef (UN Children’s Fund) and the World Food Programme have introduced some – but we were thinking of something that the Afghan people could claim ownership of,” says Dr Zaki.

“That is why we came up with the polycarbonate water filter, which you can build by using gravel, pebbles, big stones, and sand available from the river bed,” he explains.

However, during the long winter months, these filters tend to be abandoned as the water inside freezes. The Malcon 3 ISAF team overcame this by building an insulation box around the filter.

“(The water filtration system) is now available in the bazaar, and every time they go to hardware shops, they can see their own filters,” says Dr Zaki.

Healthy smiles

Another one of the team’s programmes was to work with the MOPH to come up with a system to provide dental care for the people of Bamyan.

“When we went there, we found out that there were no organisations in the MOPH that deals with oral health,” says Dr Kamal, who heads the dental team.

“They have a very simple dental clinic, which was not managed by people with licenses or degrees to practise,” he says
To help peripheral clinics in Afghanistan gain access to continuous power, Malcon 3 ISAF have embarked on a solar panel installation programme in the province of Bamyan. In this photo, Dr Zaki (second from right) and his team are helping one of the clinics install a new solar panel.

Those who provided dental services there were somewhat like the “dental carpenters” Malaya had in the 1950s, he says.

What’s more, as most people live in isolated villages spread across the mountains, many had to walk as long as three hours to get even that basic level of dental care.

“Generally, the incidence of periodontal problems (like gum problems and loose teeth) among adults is very high there,” says Dr Kamal.

“There is also a lack of dentures ... so when they have extractions done they do not know where to get (their teeth) replaced,” he adds.

The team started out by putting seven locals through a basic clinical dental training course, a 10-week programme that teaches basic dentistry techniques.

After that, the team started offering dental services at its base and later at mobile clinics it set up at hospitals in the capital Bamiyan and the Yakawlang district.

“Dental equipment was lacking there, so we also innovated the multi-purpose dental chair,” says Dr Kamal with justifiable pride, adding that the team eventually built three dental chairs with the help of local metallurgists.

At the same time, the team also worked with the Afghanistan Education Ministry on school dental health programmes and distributed close to 4,000 pairs of toothpaste and toothbrushes at schools in Bamiyan and Yakawlang.

“The team’s aim is to set up a model oral health service in one district, Yakawlang,” says Dr Kamal, adding, “If we can achieve that, the other districts can follow on their own.”

Giving gifts of life

With female officers among its ranks, the Malcon 3 ISAF team have also achieved something that was previously difficult even for local healthcare professionals: promoting blood donation and family planning.

Although family planning facilities are available in hospitals around the province, it is not well accepted.
With education and promotion, the Malcon 3 ISAF team managed to hold two blood donation drives that gained the participation of the Afghanistan national police and army.

“From what we understand, some think that they might not be able to have children after that, and that it is a way of making the Afghan population smaller,” Dr Zaki explains.

What the Malcon 3 ISAF team did instead was to introduce the concept of “family spacing” – ie, that families should wait for a few years before having another child.

“Our advantage is that we have female Muslim doctors who can talk about it,” says Dr Zaki, adding that Dr Azimah also spoke regularly on radio programmes to provide information about family spacing in the Dari language (Afghanistan’s national language) to local women.

“We have also approached the Mullah, their religious leader, to convince him that this is necessary,” says Dr Zaki.

Soon, the concept of family planning began to be more accepted by the locals and women even started approaching Dr Azimah for advice.

“With blood donation, the locals think that if they donate blood to another patient, it will take all of their blood away and they will die,” says Dr Azimah, explaining, “That was why in the past, only close relatives or family members were willing to donate blood.”

To correct these misconceptions, the team gave out flyers, put up posters in the Dari language, and educated the local community about blood donation and common diseases such as Brucellosis (an infectious disease that can pass to humans from stock animals or their products) and typhoid.

“We have even managed to conduct two blood donation drives, first with the Afghan national police and then with the Afghan national army as well,” says Dr Zaki.

“We have also called on the local press to raise public awareness about the benefits of blood donation.

“Hopefully, there will be more people who are willing to come forward to donate in the future.”

As the Malcon-ISAF teams are committed to maintaining their presence in Afghanistan until 2014, team members intend to make their programmes as sustainable as possible.

After training healthcare workers and more than 800 police, army and special forces personnel in providing basic life support, the Malcon 3 ISAF and Malcon 4 ISAF (currently in Afghanistan) started “training trainers” so that the Afghan people can eventually run the training programmes themselves.

Other efforts the teams are involved in include ensuring that peripheral clinics have access to continuous power; this involves helping those clinics install solar panels.

Worth the sacrifice

“Our message to the Afghanistan people is that the ball is at their feet, so they must take advantage of our suggestions and start doing something concrete with them,” says Dr Kamal.

While the physical demands of running these projects amidst harsh weather and environmental conditions could be overcome, Dr Zaki says that it is the emotional longing for the comforts of home that is most trying.

His fourth son was born when he was over 4,000km away from home, and Nordin welcomed his first grandson at the time.

“We could communicate with them through Skype (over the Internet) but we also wanted very much to be there for our families,” says Dr Zaki.

So is all the hardship and time away from loved ones worth it, we wonder?

It will be, say the team members, if the programmes they started continue to be practised in Afghanistan.

That would be the best reward, they conclude.

The Star

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