Daily Times

As part of its efforts to address the grievances of the local people and restore peace in insurgency-hit Balochistan, the provincial government on Sunday ordered the security institutions to immediately remove their security checkposts from the highways, after finding them “useless”.

The decision was made during a special meeting of the provincial cabinet held with Chief Minister Abdul Quddus Bizenjo in the chair to review the law and order situation in the province, where a sense of deprivation was deepening among the people.

The meeting expressed severe concerns over “setting up checkposts on the roads under the guise of security checking”. The provincial cabinet directed all the concerned federal and provincial security institutions to immediately remove the checkpoints from the highways – one of the longstanding demands of the people. “In the future, no institution will set up checkpost on the highway without the permission of the provincial government,” agreed the meeting. The establishment of the checkpost will be subjected to the permission of the home department, it added.

The participants of the meeting were of the view that the passengers, including women, children, old people and even patients were stopped for hours at the checkposts. It is the responsibility of the government and institutions to provide security to the people, they asserted. “If there is no checkpost of federal security agencies on the highways and cities in other provinces, then there should be no checkpoint in Balochistan too,” argued the participants of the meeting. Stressing the need for targeted operations, the provincial cabinet said that no terrorist was arrested from a passenger bus so far.