Daily Times

Lahore: Two days after Pashtun Tahaffuz Movement (PTM) leaders addressed a massive public gathering in Qilla Saifullah as part of their nation-wide movement against enforced disappearances and extrajudicial killings among other issues, the area police on Tuesday registered cases against them under colonial era laws pertaining to rioting and promoting enmity among different groups.

Meanwhile, the Balochistan Bar Council, the Balochistan High Court Bar Association and Quetta Bar Association have called for a complete strike in courts all over the province on Wednesday (today). In a statement released to the media, the bar leadership said that the registration of the FIR was an attempt to deny fundamental rights of expression, speech and political assembly and association to peaceful participants of the PTM.

The statement further said that those nominated in the FIR had just demanded an end to extra judicial killings, and kidnappings for ransom and urged the authorities to arrest a proclaimed offender, notorious cop Rao Anwar. It added, “the act of lodging FIRs against peaceful citizens of the country including provincial legislator Nawab Ayaz is against the law, constitution, and morality. State institutions have badly failed to provide security of life, property, and liberty. We consider act an attack on civil liberties and fundamental rights of the citizens of this country.”

The Qilla Saifullah station house officer filed an FIR against Manzoor Pashteen, Haji Hidayatullah, Ali Wazir, Khan Zaman Kakar, and former Balochistan minister and serving legislator Nawab Ayaz Khan Jogezai, among others.

The FIR was registered under sections 153 (provoking with intent to cause riot), 153(a) (promoting enmity between different groups), and 34 (acts done by several persons In furtherance of common intention) of the Pakistan Penal Code read with Section 109, which prescribes the punishment of abetment if the act abetted is committed in consequence of the abetment and where no express provision is made for its punishment.

After Qilla Saifullah, the PTM held another massive gathering in Quetta, on Sunday. Earlier, a gathering was held in Zhob against enforced disappearances, extrajudicial arrests and killings, as well as the mistreatment of the Pashtun community by security and law enforcement forces across the country.

Reports of their protest first made headlines following the extrajudicial killing of Waziristan native Naqeebullah Mehsud, a shopkeeper in Karachi.

Leaders of PTM claim that in the past two decades, 32,000 Pashtuns have gone missing from the Federally Administered Tribal Areas. They insist that their struggle is to ensure implementation of the country’s constitution under which right to a fair trial and safeguard against arbitrary arrests was guaranteed to all Pakistani citizens.

Published in Daily Times, March 14^th 2018.