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A dangerous place
As military operations continue with the aim to eliminate Baloch rebels
or force them to surrender, there is no hope of restarting political
dialogue to peacefully resolve the problems afflicting Balochistan
16-07-2006
By Rahimullah Yusufzai; http://jang.com.pk
There was a sudden increase in violence in Balochistan recently with the
government routinely making claims about killing scores of ‘miscreants’,
or ‘terrorists’, as the local press is required to describe the
nationalist Baloch combatants. Increasingly, it was also being claimed
that a growing number of Bugti Baloch fighters were abandoning their chief
Nawab Mohammad Akbar Khan Bugti and surrendering their weapons to be on
the side of the government.
However, the government’s claims about successes on the battlefield
haven’t led to an end to attacks against the security forces. There
certainly was a slight drop in acts of sabotage but the armed forces,
particularly the paramilitary Frontier Corps, continued to face attacks
not only in Dera-Bugti and Kohlu districts but also elsewhere in
Balochistan. Landmines planted by insurgents were taking toll of soldiers
and remained a big worry for the troops. There was no respite also from
rocket attacks and bomb explosions targeting gas installations,
electricity lines and railway tracks.
Balochistan is still a dangerous place and would remain so until the
root-causes of the insurgency are tackled. As military operations
continued with the aim to eliminate Baloch rebels or force them to
surrender, there was no hope of restarting political dialogue to
peacefully resolve the problems afflicting the province. In the
circumstances, it was obvious that no durable solution of the conflict was
in sight, at least in the foreseeable future.
For the second time in the recent past, government officials claimed that
Akbar Bugti, the 79-year old head of the Bugti tribe, had left his native
Dera-Bugti and shifted to Kahan in Kohlu district, the abode of the
equally rebellious Marri Baloch tribal people. Dera-Bugti’s district
coordination officer, Abdul Samad Lasi, was quoted by the press as
claiming that the Bugti tribal chief was no longer present in his mountain
hideout where he had moved several months ago after his fort-like home in
Dera-Bugti town came under military attack. Lasi’s first claim about the
departure of Akbar Bugti from his native area had proved incorrect and it
remains to be seen if he is right this time. Being a government official
and often accused of making tall claims, Lasi would have to provide
evidence to restore his credibility and prove his new claim about Akbar
Bugti’s escape to Kohlu.
Lasi, along with Raziq Bugti, an official spokesman and adviser to
Balochistan chief minister Jam Mohammad Yousaf, and the provincial police
chief Chaudhry Mohammad Yaqoob, usually brief the press about the security
situation in the province and the arrests and deaths that occur during
searches and raids by law-enforcing agencies. Akbar Bugti himself or his
son-in-law Senator Agha Shahid Bugti, who is an office-bearer of Jamhoori
Watan Party, tell their side of the story to the reporters. Then there is
Azad Baloch, who claims to speak for the shadowy Balochistan Liberation
Army, Wadera Alam Khan representing the Bugti tribal chief, and others
using fake names who regularly contact Quetta journalists to challenge
government claims and give their version of events. One has to be careful
while drawing conclusions from the usually unverified claims made by
official spokesmen and those speaking on behalf of the Baloch combatants.
As expected, Akbar Bugti’s lieutenants denied the government claim and
insisted that he was still present in his native area and was leading his
Bugti fighters in the fight against security forces. Their denial is
understandable given the belief that the departure of the Bugti tribal
head from the area would demoralise his men and weaken their resistance to
security forces. It is also pertinent to mention that government officials
in the past even made the unbelievable claim that Akbar Bugti had fled to
Iran. Such claims, it seems, are made to belittle him and cause
demoralisation among Bugtis loyal to their chief.
Even if he eventually leaves Dera-Bugti, which is possible in view of the
aerial strikes by gunship helicopters against rebel hideouts in the
Sangsila mountainous area where he is reportedly holed up, there is no
possibility that the Bugti tribal chief would give up the fight. He is too
proud a man to accept defeat. Rather, he would want to die fighting and be
remembered as a martyr to the Baloch cause. Besides, the authorities
apparently have no intention at this stage of the crisis to eliminate or
capture Akbar Bugti.
The stepped-up military activity in both Dera-Bugti and Kohlu might have
enabled the security forces to score some successes against Baloch
combatants but it has at the same time damaged the government’s
credibility. The use of Cobra gunship helicopters and other sophisticated
weapons in such actions and government claims about killing scores of
alleged terrorists has given a lie to oft-repeated official assertions
that no military operations were being conducted in Balochistan. By
admitting the use of gunship helicopters and making claims about killing,
say, 23 Baloch ‘miscreants’ in attacks on ‘farrari’ camps for fugitives in
Sangsila and Bhambore areas in Dera-Bugti on July 9, the government has
finally conceded that an elaborate military operation was on to defeat a
full-blown insurgency in parts of the province.
The fact that ‘farrari’ camps providing military training to militants are
present, as claimed by the Balochistan police chief, in distant places
such as Chaghai, Kalat and Bolan districts and attacks have taken place
from Loralai in the north of Balochistan to Gwadar in the south shows the
spread of the insurgency. Other serious developments include the killing
of government employees, so-called informers and Punjabi settlers, attacks
against pro-Islamabad politicians, and assaults on foreign-funded projects
and foreigners, including Chinese.
A dangerous new element was added to the already explosive situation when
the government brought back the Kalpar Bugtis, who have been challenging
Akbar Bugti, to Dera-Bugti for resettlement. Marri tribesmen opposed to
Nawab Khair Bakhsh Marri were also enabled to return to Kohlu. This set up
the stage for bloody confrontation within the two large Baloch tribes and
many lives have already been lost in the inter-tribal feuds.
The seriousness of the situation could be gauged from recent interviews
and statements of Balochistan’s former chief minister Sardar Attaullah
Mengal. Despite his old age and failing health, he remains relevant to the
volatile politics of the province and is at the same time a forceful voice
for the rights of Pakistan’s smaller nationalities from the platform of
the Pakistan Oppressed Nations Movement (PONM). Unlike Akbar Bugti and
Nawab Khair Bakhsh Marri, he hasn’t called upon his fellow tribesmen or
followers to take up arms against the government. But he has publicly
voiced support for all those fighting the Pakistani state in defence of
the ‘Baloch homeland and culture’ and described those laying down their
lives for this cause as martyrs. He is also on record saying that Pakistan
and Balochistan could no longer co-exist. In his view, the situation in
Balochistan has gone to a point of no-return and there was no reason to
trust President General Pervez Musharraf after he went back on his promise
to the ‘MMA Mullahs’ to quit as Army chief in return for their support for
the 17th constitutional amendment. He also wants all settlers in
Balochistan, particularly the Punjabis, to express solidarity with the
Baloch cause or simply leave Balochistan.
Opinions have hardened on both sides if one were to remember the language
used by government functionaries, including President Musharraf, against
the rebel Baloch sardars. There have been reports about young Baloch
university graduates joining the ranks of the militants and getting killed
or arrested. The younger generation of Baloch, particularly from the
affected tribes and districts, appear to be sliding toward militancy and
losing hopes in a federal Pakistan. The military operations and setting up
of new garrisons in Balochistan might bring a semblance of normalcy to
parts of the province and protect gas and other precious installations but
it would be no more than a short-term solution of the festering problem.
Imposing solutions on a largely unhappy Baloch population would not work
in the long run and instability would elude Pakistan’s largest and
resource-rich province.
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