My friend Rainy – Mixed Breed – Chapter 1

Rainy is a street dog who adopted me some time ago. He walked in one day out of the rain and plonked himself on a sofa and went to sleep. I thought of throwing him to the elements but was dissuaded by his canines that glistened in the tungsten light. Since then he and I are the best of friends. Often after a few days on the road I return to his abuses and grumbling but when things settle down we talk the talk.

My friend Rainy pic by Mark Ulyseas

Just the other day while I was unpacking after a short trip Rainy walked in and announced that he was in love

.
“Come on you can’t be serious”, I exclaimed.

“Yup, she’s the Lab that lives behind the church. She is a Reuben woman. I Like Reuben women you know they are…”

“Okay okay I get the drift”

“No you don’t get the drift…look at that broad you date, she could do with a meal, she looks like she’s just out of Somalia”…

“Don’t be racist…”

“Racist…me…this four legged furry chap. You must be joking. My folk are not racist. Do you see us ganging up according to our colour? Huh? There are no barriers in our society. The only time we get nasty is when a bitch is in heat and no one wants to queue.”

“If we can’t hold a civil conversation I suggest you go hang out at the church where Stinky your buddy sleeps on the wall.”

“Don’t change the topic. Seriously mate I am worried about you…you’ve got to get a proper woman, one that will clean the house, cook our food and get you to have a bath everyday”

“Look who’s talking, me, a bath, excuse me…have you smelled yourself lately? Oh, I forget, you guys keep smelling each other’s asses whenever you meet, what is it? A handshake?”

“You are getting personal?

“Listen I am tired, I am going for a bath and then out to my watering hole, got to meet Charlie for a beer”.

“Mate you’ve got to get your act together. Focus on the bigger issues, like getting a bigger woman. Trust me I know about these things. Lovey, the Lab, told me that her mistress who mirrors her in many ways is a great entertainer, cook and has stashed away a nice little nest egg. Lovey says she is waiting for the right guy. Imagine you and her tying up? It would be convenient for me and Lovey. One big happy family”

“You are daft. Go out and piss on some tree. I’m getting ready”

Rainy left in a huff.

Later at the watering hole I met Charlie and we discussed the latest developments in the Middle East.

“Charlie, everything’s going down the tube…”

“Even you man, look at you…get a life…come on let me introduce you to this nice lady…”

Before I could say anything Charlie beckons her to join us. Brown eyes, long hair and very much a Rueben babe.

“This is Chelsie, Chelsie this is Mark”

“Hi”

“Hi”

Charlie fades into the background as Chelsie suddenly speaks in a warm moist voice.

“Charlie tells me you are a writer? So what do you write?”

“This and that…usually I never speak about my writing. Maybe you could read some of my work when you find the time…on the net”

“Yes I would love to. But I don’t have an internet connection at home.”

“I have a high speed connection maybe when you are free we can…”

“I have a little spare time tonight…”

“Uhh… okay maybe we can go to my place around closing time”

“Sounds good”

She glided away to chat with Ann, the English school teacher.

Charlie sidled up to me and said, “So…?”

“So? We are just meeting at my place; she wants to see my stuff…read some of my work”

A few hours later, Chelsie and me are sitting in front of the comp at home and discussing my work. She is not dumb. A Phd. Someone to tickle my gray cells…she wears a charming fragrance and an aura of a lady…

We are interrupted by whining at the door. It’s Rainy, the son of a bitch, just when things are warming up.

I open the door and in walks furry face. Immediately Chelsie gets up and kneels next to Rainy, gently stroking his head.

“What a beautiful dog. He does look familiar? I wonder where I have seen him”

“His name is Rainy. I doubt you have met him.”

I give Rainy the look, which meant that if he didn’t leave immediately he would be snipped the following morning by the Vet. You know, rooster to a hen.

“Mate, I’ve got to tell you something, come out” he said with an urgent look.

“No, out, now”. I closed the door behind him and locked it.

That night as I lay next to Chelsie a second time, I was at peace. Her presence was all pervasive. Even the pillow caught her perfume. Maybe Rainy was right. Maybe we needed a woman in the house. One who could love, cook and clean the house.

The following morning she made breakfast and left after kissing me on the cheek.

At noon in walked Rainy with a lascivious grin on his face.

“Not now”

“Yes, now, mate. That woman is Lovey’s mistress. I couldn’t believe my eyes when I saw you two together. So how did go? Did you?”

“Shut up, don’t be crude”.

“You chaps never get it. Losers, you are so desperate you do it even when you are not in love. At least we have our moral code, you know. Any ways, now what? Are you going to meet again? Marriage? Come on, you can tell me”

Just then there is a bark at the door. I open it and see Chelsie with a large Lab at the door. She looks embarrassed.

“Sorry but Lovey dragged me here. I knew I had seen your dog somewhere. He is very naughty. You know he jumped over the wall and…and…did Lovey a few weeks ago. Now I am sure we are going to have mixed breed pups.”

I looked at Rainy lovingly. He was my mate and I had to stand up for him. Rainy was panting with joy to see Lovey at his front door.

“Come on in, maybe we can find homes for the pups”

“Yes, that is kind of you. May I let Lovey off the chain?”

“Sure”

Lovey and Rainy , after smelling each other’s asses settled down on the sofa licking each other and themselves.

“Mark, would you like some tea” asked Chelsie with a smile.

“Yes darling that would be nice”.

I walked out onto the verandah to smoke a cigar. Rainy joined me. We sat in silence, two men chilling out knowing we had good fine women to look after us… in a way civilising us.

That night Chelsie made me have a bath and then set up a comfortable sleeping place for Rainy and Lovey. She didn’t want the “dogs” sleeping on the sofa.

And as we lay in the dark she bit my ear and whispered, “Tomorrow I shall make Burmese Kaukswe for you”.

I smiled and clung to my Reuben woman, a delightful creature to love and behold and cherish.

Maybe Rainy was right.

But we shall have to see in the coming days.

 

How to talk dirty and influence people

The Great Lenny Bruce. A man who changed the face of obscenity and made it respectable. Sadly he was bankrupt by the many court cases he had to fight.His autobiography, How to talk dirty and influence people, was a beacon light for many among us who grew up in a stifling society straitjacketed by religion and social customs that defied logic. We will always miss you Lenny. Truly an original artist who told it like it was. In the following videos Lenny makes a statement.

Mixed Marriages

The Meaning of Obscenity

 

Scotland of the East – Shillong

Last week I bumped into an old friend and his wife. Russell is from Shillong, the capital of Meghalaya (land of the clouds), a State in the North East of India. Ronnie, as he is affectionately called, is Scottish/Khasi, i.e. father is Scottish and mother a Khasi from Meghalaya. The Khasi women are known for their beauty and also for the power that they wield in their society.

The name Shillong is derived from ‘Leishyllong’, the Superpower of God. Shillong was established in the mid-1800s by Colonel Henry Hopkinson, agent to the Governor General of India, as a refuge for the officers and staff of the East India Company during the summer months.

The Shillongese are a matriarchal society. A man gives the dowry and the man leaves his home to live in his wife’s parents’ home after marriage! There are instances where boys are kept at home to help in the house work while the girls are sent off to school.

A predominantly Christian State with echoes of the Raj reflected in the architecture, attire and other wonderful things like bakeries, pastry shops, libraries and the ubiquitous place of worship, the neighbourhood church; and momos…

Khasi woman power is formidable and one can see the hold they have over their men even when they live and work outside the State, in other parts of India.

The family, for them, is paramount.

My meeting with Ronnie and Rebecca reminded me of all this and much more. The midnight masses, the rock concerts (talented musicians continue to come out of this State to work in Mumbai and Bollywood). We also talked the talk about State politics and how their society was slowly being corrupted by rampant consumerism sweeping the country. We never slept that night.

The following morning as I waited for the taxi to drive me to the airport, leaving once again, Rebecca came up to me and placed her hand on my shoulder and said, “When will you settle, when will you set up home again? Find a nice girl and settle down.” I smiled, kissed her on the cheek and looked away muttering under my breath, “There is a time for everything”.

Btw. Kerala is the other State in India that has a matriarchal set up.

 

Live Encounters Magazine March 2012

Featuring 

Where are you from? – Carmen Roberts Fast Track BBC

A Cornerstone of Strength In Despair: Off-Beat Travels in Israel’s Galilee - Natalie Wood

Artist – get thee to a residency - Sue Healy

Maria – Terry McDonagh

Photo Feature Myanmar – Joo Peter

My Brother and I – Robin Marchesi

Matching Energy – Candess M Campbell

The Madonna - Mark Ulyseas

Great White Spot – John Chester Lewis

Shakti – a universal soul, an interview Mark Ulyseas

 

Baluchistan – Mullahs in Pakistan call for a jihad Part 6

The true face of the ally of the USA in its fight against terrorism – the Pakistani Mullah depicted in this YouTube bit… where a Mullah accuses the USA of dismembering Pakistani (East Bengal). It is apparent this learned Mullah has not gone to school, for if he did he would know it was India/USSR and not USA. In fact USA (Nixon era) threatened India with the 7th Fleet which was stationed in the Bay of Bengal during the hostilities.

USA was a good strong friend to Pakistan and they in turn bit the hand that fed them. Even dogs if fed do not bite the hand that feeds them.

I think someone should remind the learned Mullah that it is USA Aid that has kept his country running all these years; And in spite of this Civil Liberties, Human Rights and other inconsequential Rights (women, children, right to education, right to follow any religion etc.) were/are continually violated by corrupt Pakistani leaders and their coterie of middle men/women.

Why is it only about Muslims, about Islam and not about other things like living in peace with all others? Even common people in Pakistan are fed up with these rabid mullahs…news trickling out of this country being bled with a thousand cuts (self inflicted) confirms this.

It is in Pakistan’s interest to immediately stop hostilities in Baluchistan as a confidence building measure and to show the world that it is a modern nation with laws enforced to protect all those that live within its borders. (One can dream of utopia).

Om Shanti Shanti Shanti Om

 

Baluchistan – Human Rights Watch report highlights Pakistan Part 5

“Even if the president or chief justice tells us to release you, we won’t. We can torture you, or kill you, or keep you for years at our will. It is only the Army chief and the [intelligence] chief that we obey.” – Pakistani official to Bashir Azeem, the 76-year-old secretary-general of the Baloch Republican Party, during his unacknowledged detention, April 2010

“Disappearances of people of Balochistan are the most burning issue in the country. Due to this issue, the situation in Balochistan is at its worst.” – Supreme Court Justice Javed Iqbal, commenting on the establishment of the Commission of Inquiry for Missing Persons on May 4, 2010.

 “One of them pointed his gun at Abdul Nasir and shouted, ‘Get up!’ As soon as Abdul Nasir got off the ground the man walked him to their car. Since that time I have not seen Abdul.” – Witness to enforced disappearance of Abdul Nasir, June 2010

This report is based on information collected by Human Rights Watch researchers in Pakistan in 2010 and 2011. During our research on enforced disappearances in Balochistan, Human Rights Watch interviewed more than 100 individuals, including family members of “disappeared” individuals, persons who were in unacknowledged detention and later released, local human rights activists, lawyers, and witnesses. The interviews were conducted in English and in Urdu, and, where necessary, with the help of Baloch interpreters.

Human Rights Watch encountered serious difficulties in meeting Baloch witnesses, as many were reluctant to travel and meet with Human Rights Watch researchers out of fear for their safety from government security forces. Many witnesses interviewed by Human Rights Watch were visibly scared and expressed serious concerns about repercussions they may face for speaking about disappearances in the province. We have used pseudonyms for several witnesses and victims, as expressly indicated at relevant points in the text and footnotes, to protect them from possible retaliation.

Witnesses frequently described the perpetrators as armed men in civilian clothes, usually arriving in one or more four-door pickup trucks. The witnesses typically referred to these assailants as representatives of the “agencies,” a term commonly used to describe the intelligence agencies, including the Directorate for Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), Military Intelligence (MI), and the Intelligence Bureau (IB). Other information obtained by Human Rights Watch in many cases corroborates these claims.

In all the cases Human Rights Watch documented, even evident members of the security forces did not identify themselves, explain the basis for arrest or where they were taking those apprehended. Often instead they beat the victims and dragged them handcuffed and blindfolded  into their vehicles. For example, on July 1, 2010, Shams Baloch, the 49-year-old former mayor of Khuzdar town in Balochistan, was abducted from an ambulance while accompanying his sick mother to a hospital in Quetta, Balochistan’s capital. About an hour after they left Khuzdar, men in Frontier Corps uniforms stopped the ambulance at a checkpoint and ordered Baloch to get out. They proceeded to beat him, while holding others at gunpoint. Four armed men in plain clothes arrived a short time afterwards and took Baloch with them. The police refused to investigate.

In seven cases documented by Human Rights Watch, Pakistani authorities attempted to legitimize disappearances by bringing criminal charges against the missing persons. In some cases, the detainees were then transferred into police custody and brought to trial.

Balochistan, Pakistan’s western-most province, borders eastern Iran and southern Afghanistan. It is the largest of the country’s four provinces in terms of area (44 percent of the country’s land area), but the smallest in terms of population (5 percent of the country’s total). According to the last national census, in 1998, over two-thirds of its population of nearly eight million people live in rural areas. The population comprises those whose first language—an important marker of ethnic distinction in Pakistan—is Balochi (55 percent), Pashto (30 percent), Sindhi (5.6 percent), Seraki (2.6 percent), Punjabi (2.5 percent), and Urdu (1 percent).

There are three distinct geographic regions of Balochistan. The belt comprising Hub, Lasbella, and Khizdar in the east is heavily influenced by the city of Karachi, Pakistan’s sprawling economic center in Sindh province. The coastal belt comprising Makran is dominated by Gwadar port. Eastern Balochistan is the most remote part of the province. This sparsely populated region is home to the richest, though largely untapped, deposits of natural resources in Pakistan, including oil, gas, copper, and gold. Significantly, it is the area where the struggle for power between the Pakistani state and local tribal elites has been most apparent.

Balochistan is both economically and strategically important. The province borders Iran and Afghanistan, hosts a diverse ethnic mix of residents, has the second largest supply route for international forces in Afghanistan, and is allegedly home to the so-called Quetta Shura of the Taliban in the provincial capital, Quetta. 

Balochistan has historically had a tense relationship with Pakistan’s national government, in large part due to issues of provincial autonomy, control of mineral resources and exploration, and a consequent sense of deprivation. Under President Gen. Pervez Musharraf, Pakistan’s military ruler from 1999 until 2008, the situation deteriorated markedly. Two assassination attempts on Musharraf in 2005 and 2006 during visits to Balochistan resulted in a crackdown on Baloch nationalists by the armed forces and Military Intelligence (MI), its lead intelligence agency in the province. These operations ultimately led to the killing in August 2006 of influential tribal chieftain Nawab Akbar Bugti and 35 of his close followers.

Armed militant groups in Balochistan are responsible for many targeted killings and destroying private property. In the past several years, they have increasingly targeted non- Baloch civilians and their businesses, as well as major gas installations and infrastructure.

Baloch armed groups have also claimed responsibility for a series of attacks on gas pipelines and other infrastructure in the first three months of 2011. These attacks have created an acute shortage of fuel for cooking and heating during one of the coldest periods of the year. They have also struck police and security forces and military bases throughout the province.

Militancy in Balochistan has been fuelled by ethnic Baloch anger over the Pakistani government’s efforts to harness local mineral and fossil fuel resources, maintain large numbers of troops in the province, and construct the Gwadar deep-sea port at the mouth of the Persian Gulf with non-Baloch workers. The Pakistani military claims that Baloch militants receive arms and financial support from India.

Militant nationalist groups such as the Baloch Liberation Army (BLA) and the Baloch Liberation United Front (BLUF) have claimed responsibility  for most killings of non-Baloch civilians, including teachers and other education personnel. They attempt to justify these attacks as a nationalist Baloch response to grievances against the state, and retaliation against abuses that state security forces have committed against Baloch community members.

The practice of enforced disappearances by state security forces has become a distinctive feature of the conflict in Balochistan. It continues unabated to the present.

 The exact number of new “disappearances” perpetrated in recent years by Pakistan’s security forces in the province remains unknown. Baloch nationalists claim “thousands” of cases. Balochistan provincial authorities on several occasions have cited the figure of about 1,000 enforced disappearances. Pakistan’s Interior Ministry has said that 1,102 Baloch were forcibly disappeared during General Musharraf’s rule, which ended in August 2008. Many cases remain unreported as families and witnesses often prefer not to report cases to the authorities or human rights organizations because of fear of retaliation by the authorities. The Human Rights Commission of Pakistan, a nongovernmental organization, has verified 169 disappearance cases in Balochistan from 2005 to January 2011. Of these,33 people have been released or traced.

The government agencies that Human Rights Watch found to be most involved in enforced disappearances in Balochistan are Military Intelligence (MI), the Frontier Corps (FC)64 and, to a lesser extent, the Directorate for Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) and the Intelligence Bureau (IB).66 The Frontier Corps is mandated to assist local law enforcement in the maintenance of law and order and to carry out border patrol and anti-smuggling operations.

Pakistan’s intelligence agencies have long operated without any basis in law supporting their creation or functioning; the country’s highest legal officer, Attorney General Maulvi Anwarul Haq, informed the Supreme Court in November 2010 that no such legal instrument exists.67 The ISI enjoys no formal powers of arrest. Yet the agencies invoke laws such as the Security of Pakistan Act 1952, Pakistan Army Act 1952, Defence of Pakistan Act and Prevention of Anti-National Activities Act 1972 to justify their actions. However, these laws do not give the intelligence agencies any powers.

Human Rights Watch documented several cases in which local police assisted intelligence agencies in carrying out arrests that resulted in enforced disappearances.For example, on April 2, 2010, two police cars and two Toyota Hilux cars stopped a public bus in which Mehboob Wadela, 32, was travelling to Karachi from Gwadar. According to a relative, a group of men in civilian clothes took Wadela from the bus and drove him away in one of the Toyotas while the police waited outside in their vehicles.78 The police refused to file a report, and his family has learned nothing about his fate or whereabouts.

In most of the cases we documented, the victims of enforced disappearances were men in their mid-20s to mid-40s. Three of the disappeared were children, the youngest of whom was 12 years old at the time of the abduction. In three cases, the victims were over 60 years old. The oldest victim was 76 at the time of his arrest.

Most victims appeared to be targeted because of their affiliation  with Baloch nationalist political parties and movements, including the Baloch Republican Party (BRP), Baloch National Front (BNF), Baloch National Movement (BNM), and Balochistan National Party (BNP). Among the disappeared were senior leaders of Baloch nationalist parties, such as members of the BRP central committee Sangat-Sana Baloch and Mir Abdul Waheed Resani Baloch, and BRP secretary general, Bashir Azeem.

The Pakistani military and its intelligence agencies have long maintained secret detention facilities across Pakistan. Because they exist outside Pakistani law they violate international law protections against arbitrary detention. The ISI—which by all accounts runs the greatest number of secret prisons—and other state agencies are not deterred by an individual’s  high social standing or public profile from holding them in secret detention if they deem it in the interest of “national security.” The relative anonymity of a victim only simplifies matters for the responsible authorities.

Detention in secret facilities has long been used to obtain confessions or information against political and ideological opponents. The scope and duration of such secret detentions appears to have undergone a marked increase since the al Qaeda attacks on the United States on September 11, 2001. As documented by Human Rights Watch, US, and British complicity in the abduction, enforced disappearance, and torture and ill-treatment of Taliban and al Qaeda suspects in secret detention centers in Pakistan has provided the Pakistani military an opportunity to extend its illegal detention infrastructure without fear of censure and often with the covert support of its Western allies.

The most commonly mentioned facility was the Kuli camp within the large army cantonment (base) in Quetta, a detention facility run by the army. Allegations of torture by secret intelligence agencies at Kuli camp have been made by the Baloch community for several decades. Like the army cantonment generally, Kuli camp is off limits to civilian authorities and, as far as Human Rights Watch is aware, no army personnel have ever been investigated for alleged involvement in torture there.

 

Us and Them – Monsanto and Vietnam

Truth and justice have just taken a hike.

In 2005 a US court rejected a case brought by Vietnamese victims of Agent Orange.The weapon was used extensively during the Vietnam war, killing and maiming an estimated 400,000 people and leading to 500,000 birth defects.

February 24, 2012
Chemicals giant Monsanto has reached a settlement with US residents who claimed they were poisoned by chemicals used in the manufacturing of the Vietnam-era chemical weapon Agent Orange.

The long-running suit was brought by residents living near a now-defunct Monsanto plant in Nitro, West Virginia that between 1949 and 1971 produced the agricultural herbicide 2,4,5 trichlorophenoxyacidic acid, a key ingredient in Agent Orange.

The Us and Them syndrome.
Our lives, our country and our dead is better than theirs (Vietnam).

 

Mehmal Sarfraz – A Pakistani speaks out for Baluchistan – Part 4

Here is an excerpt from an article written by Mehmal Sarfraz Editor Daily Times, Pakistan, and published on February 24, 2012. (LINK)

Why are the military, ISI and the Frontier Corps (FC) still adamant on ruthlessly killing the Baloch?

 This is the fifth time an insurgency has broken out in the sparsely populated yet immensely important province — first when Balochistan was forcefully made to accede to Pakistan in 1948; the second an uprising in 1958-59 when martial law was imposed; later in 1962-63; then the historic 1973-77 Baloch struggle and the latest ongoing round of insurgency, whose embryonic beginnings were in 2002, and which escalated after Nawab Akbar Bugti’s death in 2006.

Unfortunately, we in Pakistan are not taught any of this in our textbooks. Instead, we are fed lies. And once again, we — the citizens of Pakistan — are being lied to. Last year, the Pakistan Army chief General Kayani categorically denied that a military operation was taking place in Balochistan. He also denied that the army or its intelligence agencies were involved in the killings of the Baloch. If that is so, at whose behest is the FC — a paramilitary force — pursuing the ‘kill and dump’ policy in the province? Surely the army chief can rein in the FC if he so wishes. 

The Baloch have been killed and maimed over the years without anyone so much as raising a voice in Pakistan. On February 20 this year, former ISI chief Lieutenant-General Hamid Gul acknowledged during a television talk show that Sardar Ataullah Mengal’s son, Asad, was martyred in an interrogation centre during Zulfikar Ali Bhutto’s era. In actual fact Asad and his friend Ahmed Shah Kurd were ambushed in their car near Muhammad Ali Housing Society in Karachi. Gunshots were heard, their blood was splattered all over the car, but their bodies were never found.

Some believe they were killed at the spot and their bodies taken away while others believe they were killed later in a detention centre by the military. Maybe we will never know what really happened to young Asad and his friend that day. Their families have suffered decades of torment just thinking about them. They have never had closure. They are not the only ones. The families of thousands of missing Baloch are still searching for their loved ones.

The resolution tabled in the US House of Representatives by Dana Rohrabacher says the Baloch people “have the right to self-determination and to their own sovereign country, and they should be afforded the opportunity to choose their own status”. A lot of Pakistanis went into an outrage mode at this.

Instead of focusing on the plight of the Baloch and why they want freedom from Pakistan, our media and politicians made a big fuss over the issue of sovereignty and Balochistan being an ‘internal matter’.

It was equally distressing to see the military’s bullying tactics through an ISPR press release dated February 16, 2012, against Ali Dayan Hasan, Pakistan Director at Human Rights Watch (HRW). The press release was critical of HRW’s statement released on January 30 on the Saleem Shahzad Judicial Commission Report but the ISPR’s ‘late reaction’ can only be attributed to Mr Hasan’s testimony to the US Congressional hearing on Balochistan. A smear campaign against Mr Hasan and HRW has been unleashed in the local media. How will threatening Mr Hasan or anybody else for that matter resolve the Balochistan issue?

Interior Minister Rehman Malik has offered to withdraw cases against Brahamdagh Bugti, Hyrbyair Marri and other Baloch leaders if they return to Pakistan. Mr Malik said he would personally welcome them back. But who is going to ensure the safety of Brahamdagh Bugti and Hyrbyair Marri once they are back? The government’s offer, on the face of it, is good. The problem is the government cannot save the Baloch leaders from the military. Let’s not forget what happened to the Baloch leader Nawab Nauroz Khan. An oath taken on the Quran was violated by our military in his case. (Nauroz agreed to surrender on May 15, 1959 in exchange for amnesty and settlement of the Baluchi grievances. Tikka Khan was said to have agreed to the terms of the surrender through an oath on the Quran. However, when Nauroz Khan came down from the hills, he and about 150 of his followers, including his sons and nephews, were arrested for armed rebellion against the state. On July 15, 1960 five of the leaders were executed by hanging in Hyderabad Jail. Nowroz was spared execution on account of his age, but died in Kohlu Jail in 1964).

The Baloch have been taken for a ride for the past six decades. They will not fall for such tricks again. If the government is really serious, it should ensure the release of all missing persons immediately, as has been suggested by Mian Nawaz Sharif. The military operation in Balochistan must also come to an end.

This is the least that we owe to the Baloch. Mere promises will not resolve anything.

The writer is Op-Ed Editor Daily Times.

 

Baluchistan – apartheid by Pakistan Part 3

How does one perceive the killings, disappearances and mindless torture of a people whose land is being mined of its natural resources that are carried away to power the households in other parts of the region; the indifference of the Pakistanis to the Baluchis’ right to education and medical facilities on par with “other” regions of Pakistan; and history’s track record of having forgotten the Baluchis, sidelined them for the greater cause of another nation, Pakistan?

All this can be described in one word.

Apartheid

Baluchistan is being run like an occupied country.

In Part 3 dear readers I shall share with you the life and times of a young Baluchi Student who was kidnapped, tortured, murdered with his bullet ridden body thrown on the road. That is, after having been abducted by the Pakistani Security Forces.

BSO Leader Qambar Chakar 24 yrs murdered by Pakistan

Qambar Chakar, a 24 year old Baluchi youth leader and student of The University of Baluchistan and Baluchistan University of Information Technology, Engineering and Management Sciences (BUITEMS). He organized protest rallies, marched to the Governor’s House and Chief Minister’s residence, held hunger strikes for the rights of the Baluchi students.

Chakar, who had himself successfully, sought admission at the University on merit, revolted against the admission policy and called for reforms so that more Baluchi students from remote and under-privileged areas could also be admitted there. With two other student colleagues i.e. Qambar Malik Baloch and Khurshid Baloch, late Qambar Chakar sat on a fast unto death in front of the Quetta Press Club in support of his demands.

He argued ‘merit’ was a ploy to shut down the doors of higher education for Baluchi students. If open merit was the only criteria to admit students at the BUITEMS then the beneficiaries would exclusively be the urban rich kids who had attended private schools and colleges. Hence, Baluch children from far-off districts would be outnumbered by the children of non-Baluch and non-Baluchistani bureaucrats and army officers who came from a more sophisticated educational background because of their social and economic background. Chakar’s campaign was not opposed to the ‘merit’ per se. What he stood for was actually merit but at district level so that each of Baluchistan’s thirty districts could get representation at this important educational institution.

The Government of Pakistan didn’t like the Baluchi students’ uprising and used various tactics to counter their movement. They instigated the Pashtun student organizations to issue statements to the Press in support of the Government’s controversial admission policy, which was in direct conflict with the demands of the Baluchi Students’ demands of equality.

The admission policy served the Pashtun interests because all Pashtun districts, such as Pishin, Lorali, Ziarat and Qila Abdullah. These districts are very close that are close to Quetta and therefore students from these areas could attend college in the morning and return home in the evening.

On the other hand, it took someone like Qambar Chakar a three day hjourney on rough roads to reach from his native Kech district to Quetta, the capital of Baluchistan. These harsh ground realities which enormously contributed to the Baloch backwardness caused Qambar to fight for his people’s right to education.

The Pakistani government attempted to push the Baluch students into a state of inferiority complex by telling them they were not compatible with contemporary educational challenges and therefore were shying away from facing the so-called open merit-based policy. However, the government did not explain why it had failed to provide the same level of education and facilities in schools in remote parts of Baluchistan like those available in Quetta.

Qambar did not lose his confidence in the wake of the official propaganda unleashed in the local media. He stood for what he truly believed in for the greater interest of Baluchistan’s future. As a part of his revolutionary campaign which was joined by hundreds of Baluch students, Qambar surrounded the Governor’s House until Governor Zulfiqar Ali Magsi was forced to come out to negotiate with the Baluch activist leader. The Governor offered him negotiations ‘inside the Governor’s House’, which Qambar utterly rejected saying that he would not hold secret negotiations with a government official.

“If you have to make a decision,” he told Governor Magsi, “you have to make it in front of all the students.”

Understandably, the governor, who is also the chancellor of the BUITEMS, did not concede to Qambar’s demands, nor did the latter surrender.

When the government failed to break the resolve of the young Baloch student through threats and ostentatious offers, they brazenly kidnapped Qambar on July 10, 2010 from the same educational institution where he was a student reportedly with the support of the institution’s Pashtun Vice Chancellor. The young activist was tortured, humiliated and implicated in a false case of possessing a hand grenade. Charges against him were never substantiated in court. He was detained so that he could not attend important exams. Security forces illegally detained Chakar for months. By then, he had emerged as a mature and popular student leader who once again stood for the educational rights of the Baluchi people.

He immediately returned to the political battleground, which eventually turned out to be a fatal. Incensed over his steadfastness and defiance, the security establishment eventually decided to permanently get rid of Qambar. Thus, officials kidnapped him for the second time on November 26, 2010.

He never returned.

Like hundreds of other ‘killed and dumped’ Baluchis, Qambar Chakar’s family still awaits justice. No investigation was ever conducted in his murder because those who were blamed for kidnapping and murdering him were all disappointingly the very ‘custodians of the law’.

Excerpts from Dawn and other media.

 

Baluchistan – Another “Bangladesh” in the making? Part 2

Baloch leader Nawab Akbar Bugti, killed under orders from General Musharraf

No Pakistani will forget the humiliation of the 1971 war with India and the Independence of East Pakistan which then became Bangladesh. However, there are few Pakistanis who will admit to the genocide committed by their Army under the direct command of General Yahya Khan. It is surprising that none of these mass murderers were ever brought to trial in an international court of justice. Even now if a Pakistani is confronted with this unseemly past they are quick to shrug it off as propaganda.

Baluchistan is heading down the same path for the very same reasons that East Bengal became independent.

• Denial of rights and privileges of the common people
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• The looting of natural resources with no corresponding development in infrastructure.
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• Little or non-existent development in education, medical facilities and citizens’ rights equal to those in other provinces.
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• Governance through muscle power, torture, extra judicial killings and more.
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• Arbitrary “management” of Baluchistan like a subjugated State.

The above factors have resulted in:

• Like the case of East Pakistani’s Mukti Bahini (people’s armed struggle for self-determination led by Sheikh Mujibur Rehman), home grown resistant movements have sprung up to fight the Pakistani injustices – the Baloch National Front, Baluchistan Republican Party and Baluchistan Liberation Army.
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•  Like the case of the Pakistani Army lining up and shooting in cold blood professors, students, doctors etc. in an effort to destroy the intelligentsia in East Pakistan; the Pakistani Army is repeating its act in Baluchistan through abduction, torture and murder…dumping of bodies on the roads. “The bodies surface quietly, like corks bobbing up in the dark. They come in twos and threes, a few times a week, dumped on desolate mountains or empty city roads, bearing the scars of great cruelty. Arms and legs are snapped; faces are bruised and swollen. Flesh is sliced with knives or punctured with drills; genitals are singed with electric prods. In some cases the bodies are unrecognisable, sprinkled with lime or chewed by wild animals. All have a gunshot wound in the head. This gruesome parade of corpses has been surfacing in Baluchistan, Pakistan’s largest province, since last July. Several human rights groups, including Amnesty International, have accounted for more than 100 bodies – lawyers, students, taxi drivers, farm workers.”
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•  Like the denial of Civil and Human Rights in the then East Bengal; One sees this in Baluchistan under the garb of national security.
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•  East Pakistan became Bangladesh because India chose to “assist” the Mukti Bahini. The Indian Army went in and liberated the country in 2 weeks and then withdrew immediately.

Unfortunately, in the case of Baluchistan, India has all but ignored the ongoing genocide. Is it time to bite the bullet and help in the creation of an independent Baluchistan?

Why this “sudden” interest in Baluchistan?

• Interestingly this is not sudden. It is sudden for those that don’t take time out to read in depth what is really happening in the rogue terrorist State of Pakistan. In the past, all the terrible happenings in Baluchistan were overshadowed by the farce of the US-Pak fight against terrorism.
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• Many countries, including India, vociferously objected to Pakistani’s dirty war but this was not acknowledged either by the US and many other Western nations. It is only when things went sour and Mr. Osama Bin laden was killed in the heart of Pakistan that the world saw the country with its pants down and at last accepted the fact that a leopard’s doesn’t change its spots…a Muslim State protecting their own even if they were mass murderers… religion runs thicker than political alliances or money.
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• One cannot deny there is an interest in the natural resources of Baluchistan. Pakistan’s commerce and industry benefit from it but not the Baluchis.

The US and its allies are concerned about Baluchistan for some of the following reasons:

•  Pakistan has failed to deliver on the terror network inspite of the billions of dollars of handouts.
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• The “war” in Afghanistan will never be won for the aforementioned reason.
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• Iran’s nuclear plans threaten to destabilize the region and throw it into a “Cold War”. (Baluchistan shares a common border with Iran).
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• The Chinese have settled into the port city of Gwadar. By giving Chinese access to a warm water port and parts of Pakistan Occupied Kashmir it has effectively given their friend a ring side view of India. (Arunachal Pradesh in the East, Kashmir in the North and Baluchistan in the West). Now Chinese navy vessels can have a port for refueling, rearming etc..And with China siding with Iran in the nuclear standoff this is a dangerous situation.
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• Some suggest this is an ideal opportunity to dismember a rogue terrorist State, give independence to Baluchistan, help them develop into a strong State, kick the Chinese out of Gwadar and breath down the necks of the Iranians.

So will Baluchistan go the way of East Pakistan and will it become “another” Bangladesh? Only time will tell but for now all the signs point to the independence of Baluchistan, and rightly so!

Written with references from The Times of India, The Guardian, BBC News reports, etc.