PkMAP protests against targetkillings in Quetta

Muhammad Ejaz KhanTuesday, April 24, 2012

QUETTA: The office bearers and activists of the Pakhtunkhawa Milli Awami Party (PkMAP) took out a protest rally in the provincial capital on Monday against the target killings of members of the Hazara community in Quetta. They also denounced the killings of Pashtoons in Karachi.

The protest rally, led by provincial president of PkMAP Usman Khan Kakar, Dr Hamid Khan Achakzai, Abdul Raheem Khan Ziaratwal and others, was taken out from the central secretariat of the PkMAP and marched through various roads and streets of the city. The protestors carried out placards and banners inscribed with slogans ìstop target killings at Quetta and Karachiî.

The protestors chanted slogans against target killings and failure of the Balochistan government, demanding immediate arrests of the culprits involved in the heinous crime. One of the slogans inscribed on a banner was “Provide us security and restore peace of Quetta and Karachi”.

The protest rally of PkMAP later turned into a public meeting at Bacha Khan Chowk where the leaders of the PkMAP strongly condemned the killings of innocents people at Quetta and Karachi and demanded of the government to provide them security. They observed that the government was oblivious about the gravity of the situation, while the target killers were playing havoc on the city’s roads, they remarked.

The held the federal and provincial governments responsible of the killings of innocents people and demanded that the government should fulfill its constitutional obligations. If the government could not provide security to the life and property of the citizens then the people would be left with no other option but to press the government to step down, they added.

The leaders of the PkMAP asserted that the Pashtoons had always rendered greats sacrifices and foiled the nefarious designs and added that the Pashtoons had defeated the designs whenever conspiracies had been hatched for extremism, terrorism and sectarians.

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Hazara people are no aliens; Tariq Baloch

From the Newspaper 

THIS is with reference to Irfan Hussain’s eye-opening letter (April 18) in which he has rightly explained the agony of the ethnic community in Balochistan.

Hazaras claim their legacy to 13th century warrior Changez Khan; therefore, they add the title ‘Changezi’ with their names.

The community has been continuously migrating from Afghan province Bamian and its surroundings, in the north of Kabul, where they held ancestral land all the way up to Balochistan.

The first blow came to them when Khan Abdur Rehman of Kabul started butchering them on sectarian grounds in the late 19th century.

Major groups started settling in parts of Balochistan. However, several families migrated during the 1960s and 1970s. The migration still continues as families are moving to Karachi and abroad.

As an enterprising and united community, they have excelled in major services and business opportunities in the last 30 years or so. General Musa Khan is an example who remained Governor of Balochistan for many years. I can remember my childhood days of the late 1980s when I saw this gentleman walking alone along Zarghoon Road. This was his simplicity and genuineness as he was also a tribal elder. He was a jewel of Balochistan.

The Hazara community enjoys good relations with the Pashtun and especially with the Baloch due to their linguistic similarities.

The only negative events I remember were the July 1984 one (where the Hazara were entangled with police and FC) and the one in the 1990s in which it had a conflict with Pashtun groups.

It is difficult to ascertain any responsibility on any one group for both events, as some foreign hands were playing their games in those times and still do.

Although the Balochistan government is incapable of staving off conflict due to corruption, I still see a foreign hand in the situation faced by the Hazara in Balochistan. The Hazaras are jewels of Balochistan and sons of the soil.

I request the authorities concerned to take stringent action against sectarian groups.

TARIQ BALOCH
Karachi

DAWN