on 2007/8/6 7:50:00
QUETTA: Two un-identified motorcyclists attacked Superintendent Office of District Jail Quetta with a hand-grenade on Sunday morning and fled away.

Due to attack, the main gate, the walls were damaged, and no loss of human life reported. Police registered a case against unknown person and launched their hunt to arrest the accused. It is to mention here that security is on high alert and police and law enforcers have set up check posts at many spots in the city.

Baloch Freedom Fighters of (BLA) claimed the reponsibility for the attack.

Baloch families face death, despair
on 2007/8/6 6:30:00 (5 reads)
By Aroosa Masroor, Karachi

The children of Baloch families residing in Fakeer Mohammad Goth — near Sohrab Goth — are dying of waterborne diseases such as diarrhoea after the recent distribution of relief goods in the area.

These families, comprising over 500 people, migrated from the Sangsilla district in Dera Bugti, Balochistan, some five to six months ago when the government launched air strikes in the region. Fearing for their lives, the people left their homes and belongings and came to Karachi to seek refuge. On their arrival, one of the Baloch leaders in Fakeer Goth, Usman Bugti, helped the families by allotting them a piece of land where they built their huts.

However, during the recent rainstorm, the already distressed families were faced with another challenge when their houses were blown away. Realising their need for humanitarian aid, some NGOs distributed relief goods including food hampers, which the families claim contained stale food items.

“I just buried my eight-year-old son three days back,” lamented a father, Jamal Khan, adding that the grave digger charged him Rs200, which is a fairly high amount for a man who has been unemployed for the last few months.

These displaced families have lost many children ever since they moved to Karachi. “One of my grandsons died on our way to Karachi out of hunger and thirst. We had to walk for seven to eight hours continuously,” said Miram Khatoon, who looked over 60 years of age but said she was only 50. “It is poverty that makes us look so much older,” she added.

While some children starved to death on their way to Karachi, there are others who could not survive after consuming leftover, rotten vegetables from the New Sabzi Mandi. “We don’t have any means of earning here so it is difficult to have a meal daily. We cook the leftover vegetables our children bring from the Sabzi Mandi at night,” said a mother. She told The News that due to unemployment, most of the women and children have started begging. “We travel to the city on a public bus every morning. That’s how we bring home some money.”

These families do not have access to safe drinking water either and women have to walk several kilometres to fetch water from a hose pipe. “For bathing and washing clothes, we use water from a stream nearby,” revealed a woman. It was later learnt that sewage water drained into that stream.

The men also complained that they lost most of their cattle during the recent rains and do not have money to buy more. “On top of that the food items we received were also old and resulted in further deaths,” said Khan. Abdul Wahad said that the language barrier is an additional problem for those looking for employment. “Except for a few, no one can speak or understand Urdu at all and feel quite alien in this city,” he said.

The families are residing in miserable conditions but they have no other option, they say. “In Sangsilla, we were being bombarded day and night. The air strikes just wouldn’t stop. Even though all our belongings are there, we cannot think of going back. We are now at the mercy of God,” said a very hopeless Amiran, an old man who is still recovering from a bullet injury he accidentally received during the air strike five months ago. “The poor people have nothing to do with politics, then why is the government targeting us?” he questioned.

Some of the families moved from Jaffarabad and Dera Ismail Khan two years back and assisted those who gradually followed. These homeless families will only add to the growing population of unregistered migrants in the city if the government does not take serious notice. However, a recent visit by the team of the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP) has given them a ray of hope.

www.thenews.com.pk/daily_detail.asp


Arrest of 25 tribesmen condemned
on 2007/8/6 6:30:00 (2 reads)
QUETTA, Aug 5: The Anjuman Ittehad Marri on Sunday condemned the arrest of 25 tribesmen from the city’s New Kahan suburb and said oppression could not suppress the Baloch political movement led by Nawab Khair Bakhsh Marri.

In a statement issued here, the organisation said personnel of the ISI, ATF, Rangers and police, who came in about 30 vehicles, encircled the New Kahan area the other day and started searching houses without fulfilling legal formalities.

It said the people arrested by the security forces were labourers, drivers and students and their fault was that they belonged to the Marri tribe.

It asserted that intelligence agencies had conducted several raids in New Kahan during the last seven years and had taken hundreds of innocent people in custody, who were tortured in secret cells.

The statement said the arrested people had not committed any crime, nor the intelligence agencies had been able to make them confess to involvement in some crime.