Baloch leaders resign en masse

ISLAMABAD: As three mainstream political parties of Pakistan — the Sharif-led PML, the Bhutto-led PPP and the Qazi-led MMA, are still contemplating to quite the national and the provincial assemblies as a mark of protest over the brutal assassination of veteran Baloch nationalist leader Nawab Akbar Khan Bugti in a military operation and the disgraceful burial of his body in the absence of his family members, the elected members of the Balochistan National Party (BNP) have submitted their resignations from the upper and the lower houses of the parliament as well as from the provincial and the district assemblies of the trouble stricken province.

While making this announcement in Quetta on Tuesday, the former chief minister of Balochistan Sardar, Akhtar Mengal, said that after the killing of the Bugti tribe chief, a blood thirsty General Pervez Musharraf has now tasked his Army troops to eliminate the leaders of the Mengal and Marri tribes.

The Baloch leader said that by labelling Sardar Attaullah Khan Merngal and Sardar Khair Bux Marri as terrorists on Sunday at a press conference in Islamabad, the Musharraf junta has already made public its anti-Baloch nefarious designs which could eventually lead to yet another dismemberment of Pakistan as had happened in 1971.

He added that all the nationalist forces of Balochistan are about to join hands to launch a forceful agitation against the ongoing military operation in Balochistan. 

Akhtar Mengal said the construction of army cantonments and the deployment of thousands of army troops throughout Balochistan presents a picture of siege and has created a sense of insecurity among Baloch people.

“General Musharraf is treating Balochistan as a Garrison province. He has already established four mega Military Cantonments in the province, 52 Para-Military cantonments, five Navel bases including Jinnah navel base in Gwadar, six major Air Force bases, three nuclear testing sites and six missile testing ranges in Balochistan and yet he still wants to set up more cantonments and naval and air force bases in Dera Bugti, Kohlu and a few other districts.”

The leader said that the acts of terror and humiliation and a continuum of the state terrorism against Baloch nationalists would not only increase the ever present tension and hatred between Baloch people and the Pakistani police, but it could lead to a point where a bloody confrontation between the Baloch and the Pakistani state is inevitable.

He warned that the fight was now be directly between the Punjabi Army and the Baloch people and the Pakhtuns should immediately distance themselves from Punjab in the conflict.

He said the mighty military establishment had killed Akbar Bugti because he was a true nationalist who used to raise his voice for the due rights of Balochistan. “But let me tell you, we will definitely avenge his brutal killing,” he concluded.