Insurgents suffer bloody reprisals

QUETTA: A deadly campaign of killings in Baloch areas has driven a low-level insurgency in Balochistan further underground, curtailing insurgent attacks in the province but raising fears that a new generation of Baloch youth may embrace separatist violence.Since June last year, the bodies of approximately 170 Baloch men aged between 20 and 40 have been recovered, victims of the so-called ‘kill and dump’ operations.

The killings have helped perpetuate a climate of fear, anger and uncertainty in Quetta and in the Baloch-dominated areas of the province which have already been racked by insurgent violence and a surge in criminal activity as security forces focused on combating the insurgency.

The modus operandi of the ‘kill and dump’ operations begins with security and intelligence personnel in uniform and plain clothes arriving in convoys of two to six vehicles outside the homes of victims or sometimes snatching them from nearby shops or roads.

A few days later — sometimes several weeks later — the bodies turn up in adjoining districts, dumped at a distance from the nearest road or population centre but in places where the bodies are likely to be found eventually. The victims are usually shot in the temple once.

Known locally as ‘mutilated bodies’, the signs of torture are often hard to determine because many of the bodies have already begun to decompose when discovered.

For most Baloch nationalists and human rights activists, the affiliation of the killers is an open secret: the Pakistani security forces. Led by the ISI and frequently assisted by the Frontier Corps Balochistan — though other agencies are also believed to be involved — the campaign of extrajudicial killings has occurred across Baloch-dominated areas in Quetta and in a vast sweep south towards the Arabian Sea.

The victims are often described in media reports as students, political workers, shopkeepers, government servants and labourers. However, security officials maintain there is a dark side to the victims: they are active members of the Baloch insurgency and are responsible for the deaths of civilians and security forces.

Since no extrajudicial killing has been properly investigated or successfully prosecuted, there is no legal proof of the security officials’ claims.

But in a series of interviews with Dawn in Quetta and other insurgency-hit parts of the province, security and government officials, politicians, journalists, area notables and locals suggested that the intelligence and security agencies have been conducting an extrajudicial ‘killing the killers’ campaign against Baloch insurgents since mid-2010.

All requested anonymity to speak about the deaths, with many outside the security apparatus expressing fear of reprisals from the insurgents.

‘Killing the killers’

Perhaps the most notorious ample of an alleged insurgent eliminated in an extrajudicial killing is Majeed Lango, killed in an FC encounter in Quetta in March last year.

Reaction to Lango’s death was swift, with some Baloch groups and obscure websites condemning the murder of an ‘innocent’ Baloch. But security officials in Quetta tell a very different story, accusing Lango of being the Quetta commander of the Baloch Liberation Army and responsible for over 200 deaths in the city.

The officials’ claim was corroborated by several journalists and other officials familiar with the Lango case. “Look at all the areas and roads, Safdar Road, Brewery Road, Railway Colony, where the target killings of settlers were happening, you won’t find them happening” since Lango was killed, according to a veteran journalist.

Inspector General of the Frontier Corps, Balochistan, Maj Gen Obaidullah Khan, when asked about the FC’s role in Majeed Lango’s death, said: “I have no problem with encounters as long as they are taking out murderers. Yes, a murder is a murder, but in your heart you feel less pain if a murderer is killed.”

A senior security official was adamant there was no other alternative to the extrajudicial killings, given the problems with the existing legal and tribal systems. “It’s nice to talk about principles and the state’s responsibilities, but I cannot ignore the pain” of the victims of the insurgency, the official said.

Decline in insurgent violence

The spike in killings by the security forces has mirrored a dramatic decline in the ‘target killings’ of Punjabi settlers who have been in the cross-hairs of the insurgents as a purported symbol of the federation the insurgents want to break from.

According to Muhammad Amir of the Balochistan Punjabi Ittihad, a group which tracks killings of settlers in the province, nearly 1,200 settlers have been killed so far, the vast majority in 2008-10.

“Things have been better in the last six to eight months with around 10-12 deaths being reported,” Amir claimed, adding that the exodus of Punjabi settlers from Quetta has begun to be reversed.

“Two hundred thousand settlers left Quetta since 2008 and property prices fell by as much as 60 per cent in some parts of the city, but nearly a hundred thousand have returned in the last year,” Amir said.

Insurgent violence has far from disappeared, though. “Violence is down, but it’s still a concern. Much more needs to be done,” IGFC Gen Khan said. In mid-June, a bomb attached to a motorcycle in Panjgur was detonated as an FC convoy was passing by, injuring more than a dozen FC personnel and killing three civilians, including two children.

Target killings carried out by insurgents of Baloch moderates — political workers belonging to nationalist parties like the BNP-M and the National Party — have also continued. On June 3, a National Party leader in Turbat, Nasim Jangiyan, was killed by motorcyclists who opened fire and fled. Jangiyan’s killing has been blamed on the Balochistan Liberation Front, which regards the popular BNP-M and NP as traitors to the Baloch cause.

An expanding range of targets?

With insurgent violence diminished but extant, the extrajudicial killings look set to continue. In fact, some analysts privately suggested that the murder of Saba Dashtiyari, a leftist radical who lectured at Balochistan University, on June 1 may have marked the beginning of a policy to also eliminate political supporters of the insurgency.

When asked about the allegations that Dashtiyari had been killed by the intelligence agencies, a senior security official responded defiantly: “Who owned his death? The BLA did. They put out statements eulogising him. Who was he close to? What were his politics?”

Multiple sources confirmed to Dawn that Dashtiyari, while never having taken up arms himself, was close to insurgent groups and at various times had exhorted violence against the state and other ethnicities living in Balochistan.

According to Shahzada Zulfiqar, a senior Quetta-based journalist, the purpose behind eliminating non-armed supporters of the insurgency is to “send a message to the Baloch population at large that anti-Pakistan sentiment and outspokenness will be punished”.

But Zulfiqar warned that the extrajudicial tactics being used to try and quell the insurgency could trigger a backlash. “If you turn up in a village and search 100 homes and take away 10 youths, you will earn the hatred of all,” Zulfikar said.Resentment against the security forces remains all too easy to find in the Baloch heartland.In Mangucher tehsil of Kalat district, a particularly violent battleground of the insurgency, a local recounted the words of the mother of a youth whose decomposed body had been brought home for burial: “The mother forbade anyone from crying. She said it was a day of happiness because her son would never be forgotten now.”

A weaker insurgency, but with new contours

QUETTA: The decline in insurgent violence over the past year, at the cost of savage violence by the state, has produced a fragile recovery in Quetta and other insurgency-hit parts of Balochistan.

In the provincial capital, markets are open past sunset, rowdy traffic clogs streets well into the evening and the occasional park in the city has more visitors than a year ago.

But fear and apprehension are never far from the surface. The Baloch quarters in Quetta are accessible to non-Baloch visitors, but outsiders are still cautioned by residents against frequent or unnecessary visits. The modern and spacious Sheikh Zayed Hospital in the Sariab Road area is largely deserted. Doctors, mostly non-Baloch, are still unwilling to work in the Baloch neighbourhood.

“The no-go situation of earlier years is perhaps no more,” according to Dr Ishaque Baloch, a central vice president of the National Party, “But it’s still very tense. Similarly, you can travel outside Quetta now, but there are dangers.”In Mastung, a town south of Quetta, residents acknowledged that while insurgent violence was down, fear and uncertainty are still rife. Teachers bussed in from Quetta each day arrive irregularly and the local womenfolk return home before sunset. Locals reported that shops shut early, roads were deserted after sunset and few residents left their homes after dark.

A low-level insurgency

Gauging support for the fifth Baloch insurgency since Pakistan’s creation or assessing the number of active insurgents is particularly tough given the two-pronged threat confronting independent voices: from the security apparatus and from insurgents.

Meanwhile, official statements are often problematic because of stakes in the present set-up and because of the deep ethnic and tribal fault lines that characterise the province.

“Go around the province, visit the different Baloch belts and you’ll see that the insurgency does not have much support,” said Nawab Aslam Raisani, chief minister of Balochistan. But Raisani’s home district is Mastung, where insurgent and criminal activities have left residents fearful.

Aslam Bhootani, speaker of the provincial assembly, also tried to downplay the strength of the insurgents: “More people die in Karachi each day. When diplomats visit here, they urge us to tell the world more about the realities of Balochistan. Balochistan is more normal than people expect.”

But MPAs move in heavily guarded convoys in Quetta.

What seems relatively clear, though, is that the present insurgency is much less severe than the last one. “This isn’t like the insurgency of the ’70s when tens of thousands participated. There are only a few hundred now. The support just isn’t there,” claimed Anwarul Haq Kakar, a local PML-N politician.

That view was echoed by several journalists, notables and locals of Baloch areas who spoke off the record.

Mapping the insurgency

The present insurgency has three main components. The Baloch Republican Army focuses on Dera Bugti, Kohlu, Jaffarabad and Naseerabad. It is led by Brahmdagh Bugti, who left his base in Afghanistan for Switzerland earlier this year.

The Baloch Liberation Army is operationally headed by Hyarbyar Marri, who is in self-exile in London. Nawab Khair Bakhsh Marri is the guiding force of the group and resides in Karachi.

The Baloch Liberation Front, with an ever-changing list of offshoots, BLUF, BLNF, Baloch Warna, etc, is largely the militant arm of the Balochistan Students Organisation (Azad).

According to a security official, “overall there are about 1,000 terrorists (sic) of which the high-quality ones are around 250.” The official added: “BLA has maybe 200 hardcore fighters, BLF 300-400 and the Bugti camps around 400.”

The IGFC Maj-Gen Obaidullah Khan also claimed that the insurgents “were not in the thousands, probably less than a thousand”. But there is a caveat, as pointed out by Gen Khan: “There are also sympathisers that need to be taken into account.”

Given tribal linkages, an armed insurgent can often rely on support from fellow tribesmen. Another security official mentioned the case of ‘Pahari Bugti’, an insurgent who recently surrendered along with 15 of his fighters after succumbing to inducements by officials. The official claimed that “around 400 others who support and owe loyalty” to Pahari Bugti had also been sidelined as a result.

Another, indirect, way of gauging the strength of the insurgency is the missing persons issue — Baloch men allegedly linked to the insurgency and illegally held by the security forces without charges.

Abdul Qadir Baloch, vice chairman of the Voice for Baloch Missing Persons, claimed that there are “12,000 to 14,000” missing persons across the province. But the Balochistan High Court, which has more forcefully taken up the missing persons issue in the last couple of years, has only
34 petitions pending before it. Eighty persons have been recovered so far and 55 cases have been disposed of.

A new phenomenon

While the latest armed insurgency may be relatively small, it has given rise to a new phenomenon: the educated, middle-class, non-tribal insurgent.

Forming the core of the BLF, this new breed of insurgent is epitomised by Dr Allah Nazar. The insurgent from Mashkey in the south of the province has increasingly become the face of the Baloch insurgency, in part, according to Ayub Tarin, a local journalist who interviewed Nazar last year, because of the departure of his rivals.

“Brahmdagh Bugti is in Geneva, Hyarbyar Marri in London, the people see that Allah Nazar is still here, still fighting himself. That has an impact,” Tarin said.

The details of Nazar’s life are murky. He appears to have embraced separatist politics as a member of the BSO during his days as a student at Bolan Medical College before taking up arms alongside the Marris and the Bugtis in the early to mid-2000s.Reportedly detained and released several times by the Pakistani security forces, he was again released some three years ago. Journalists claim that Nazar had been tortured so badly that he was on the verge of death at the time of his release and spent several months in hospital. When he recovered, he ‘left for the hills’ — a term used to describe Baloch insurgents.

A soft-spoken man, Allah Nazar’s views are uncompromising. In the interview with Tarin, Nazar repeatedly justified the killing of Punjabi settlers, describing them variously as “a fifth column”, “a brigade of the state”, “members of the army” and “spies”. He also rejected non-violent, democratic means for attaining Baloch independence, citing the example of East Pakistan.

But those hard-line views appear to have gained traction with a number of degree-holding Baloch men. Tarin, the journalist who interviewed Nazar last summer, claims that of the fighters who were with Nazar, “many were doctors and engineers”.

Siddiq Baloch, incarcerated during much of the last insurgency and now editor of the Balochistan Express, suggested there has always been a streak of resistance among Baloch ‘commoners’: “They tell the sardars to shut up. They all think they are sardars.”

Outwardly, security officials are dismissive of the influence of Allah Nazar and his fighters. One mocked him: “Allah Nazar found the insurgent lifestyle irresistible. He’s a lower-class guy. He thought he’d get money and fame through rejecting Pakistan.”

But local analysts suggest the real reason for the rise of Allah Nazar and his fighters is the policies of the state itself. “They saw the security situation, they saw the oppression, they’ve seen how the Baloch are treated,” said a local journalist.

And with the state’s response to separatist sentiment still mired in lethality, the potential for more educated, middle-class, non-tribal Baloch men to embrace violence would appear to be high.

A recipe for failure

QUETTA: The state’s response to the latest Baloch insurgency can easily be summed up: bullets and rupees.

The extrajudicial elimination of armed insurgents and supporters of Baloch separatism by the security forces along with pouring record sums of money into provincial coffers for development and current expenditure represents a two-pronged approach to tamping down the insurgency.

Some security officials believe the approach is working. “Shops are reopening, property prices are going up, settlers are returning,” argued an official dealing with the military side of the state’s response.

But others are not so sure. Chief Minister Nawab Aslam Raisani suggested the downturn in insurgent violence is only a `lull’.

“The problem has not gone away,” Raisani said.

Such thoughts were echoed by other security officials. IGFC Maj Gen Obaidullah Khan said, “All insurgencies have the same cycle. Violence goes up, then the state responds militarily and then the political machinery kicks in. But the political side just isn’t up to the task at the moment.”

Security forces vs civilians

It’s an old problem in Balochistan: civilian officials claim the security forces compound insurgencies by trying to quell them using violence; security officials claim corruption and incompetence of civilian governments undermine military gains.

In truth, both the security and civilian arms of the state are to blame.

Of the security forces’ approach, a local politician asked, “Say they eliminate all the militants; then what? If you have no plan for what comes next, you risk losing those areas all over again.”

Agha Hassan Baloch, central information secretary of the BNP-M, said, “The problem is the state still hasn’t understood what the problem is. It’s not just about building roads and drains and providing jobs. They need to end the military operations and go back to the barracks. Recover the missing people. Find out who is responsible for the dead bodies turning up.”

But civilian officials from the chief minister downwards suggest they have been rebuffed by the security establishment when trying to broach the issue of ‘kill and dump’ operations, the security forces’ violent approach to dealing with separatists over the past year.

On the civilian side, at present a significant part of the problem appears to be that popular nationalist parties like the Baloch BNP-M and NP boycotted the Feb 2008 elections, leaving the door open for relatively weak Baloch politicians. “It was a mistake. We were misled by Nawaz Sharif and then weren’t able to wriggle out of the boycott pledge,” a National Party leader said.

The outcome of that mistake is a provincial government immersed in the old tribal politics of Balochistan. “Nawab Raisani wants to make a difference, but the trouble is he’s got a weak team. And he can’t push too hard because of the problems with (Yar Muhammad) Rind, who will pull everyone to his side if Raisani demands too much,” said a local politician.

The powerful Rind, one of a handful of opposition MPAs in the 65-member Balochistan Assembly, is locked in a bitter feud with Raisani, whose father Rind is accused of killing.

Record provincial funds

Weak though it may be, the provincial government has massive, unprecedented resources at its disposal. According to Syed Fazl-e-Haider, author of ‘The Economic Development of Balochistan’: “Under the 7th NFC award, Balochistan’s share in the divisible pool increased to 9 per cent from the earlier 5 per cent. It also succeeded in getting Rs120bn in gas development surcharge arrears outstanding since 1954, which would be paid in annual instalments of Rs12bn.”

The result is a spectacular increase in funding for the province, with receipts and expenditure doubling between 2009-10 and 2010-11. Balochistan’s annual development programme for the last financial year clocked in at Rs27bn as compared to Rs13bn in 2007-08.

The spending spree is visible in Mastung town, part of Chief Minister Raisani’s constituency. Overseen by District Commissioner Noorul Haq, a dynamo of a civil servant constantly checking his BlackBerry or iPad, the town is set to acquire a Rs230 million hospital spread over nearly 30 acres of land, a massive education complex that will house everything from primary schools to degree-awarding colleges, a squash court, a town hall and sundry other multi-million-rupee development projects.

Yet, critics contend that many such projects are white elephants and dreamt up as vehicles for earning lucrative kickbacks.

With each MPA given Rs180 million as discretionary funds in the present financial year and Rs250 million in the next, the incentive to spend is high.

An MPA explained how the process works: “You don’t just get money to put in your pocket. It’s indirect and revolves around contracts. Say some business needs protection in your area. They also need to rent vehicles. So they rent the vehicles they need from you, but instead of the normal rate of Rs1,000, they’ll pay you Rs5,000.”

While buildings are relatively easy to erect — though skilled non-Baloch labour is often hard to acquire given the security situation — the problems of staffing and maintenance are harder to resolve. In Mastung, a resident complained that the existing hospital “has no MBBS doctors, no medicines, not even Panadol.”

At the local girls’ college, a state-of-the-art computer centre with air conditioning and a back-up generator has been completed recently. While pleased with the new facility, several students asked Noorul Haq, the district commissioner, to waive the Rs100-200 monthly fee charged by college administrators to keep the lab functional. Haq expressed surprise over the demand for a fee and promised it would be revoked. But it was telling example of the pitfalls that await new development projects.

Still, the spending does appear to be having an impact. In adjoining Kalat, a local, Mir Karim Lango, regarded the development spending in Mastung with envy. “Look around, we get nothing here. No schools, no hospitals, nothing,” Lango said. The Langos of Mangucher, Kalat, have an unfortunate track record of supporting losing candidates in elections, meaning they are frequently overlooked when it comes to development spending.

Even where development funds are being spent in Baloch areas, however, the harsh realities of life are difficult to mask.

Grinding poverty is all too visible among the adobe homes in rural areas and many parts of the small towns. In Mastung district (population: 200,000), the literacy rate for males hovers around 30 per cent and is under 20 per cent for women.

No will to change

In Quetta, too, the more subtle forms of Baloch marginalisation are evident. Baloch bureaucrats and police officials frequently complained of under-representation in the services. Zafarullah Baloch, the serving home secretary and, according to him, one of only two Baloch to have held the office since 1972, said: “There is discrimination in the services. Today, there is no federal secretary who is a Baloch.”

But as Fazl-e-Hyder explained, the problem is more complex: “The percentage of Baloch in federal services is nominal due to the province’s small quota (3.5 per cent), while it is larger than Pashtuns and other ethnic groups in the provincial services due to district-wise quota in provincial jobs.”

According to Hyder the real problem in Balochistan is that it is “short of professionals and experts. It lacks the institutional capacity and human capital to utilise its vast natural resources.”

Acquiring the necessary doctors, engineers, economists and academicians, though, would require a paradigm shift in how Balochistan’s elite regard their province and its people. But, as one analyst pointed out, the will to change is almost non-existent: “The civilian government is happy enough. As long as the insurgency survives, money will pour their way. Why should they care?”