Sindhis knock at Rishi Sunak’s door, petition against enforced disappearances in Pakistan

Pakistan has bad news coming in from all directions.

Sindhi nationalists, seeking an independent Sindhudesh nation from Pakistan submitted a petition to the British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak on Monday requesting him to press upon Pakistan to stop enforced appearances of the Sindhi community and release missing persons.

The Sindhi human rights campaigners also held a protest in London over the State-sponsored kidnappings of Sindhi and Baloch people by Pakistan’s security and spy agencies. They demanded the release of hundreds of missing persons in Sindh who have been abducted by the Pakistani security forces.

Speaking about the issue of enforced disappearances of people of different ethnicities, chairperson of the World Sindhi Congress (WSC) Rubina Shaikh said: “We have to show solidarity with our Baloch brothers in this grave cause. The issue of abductions is not only about human rights but is actually about environmental justice and resources”.

Shaikh said that since the “so-called independence of Pakistan, hundreds or thousands of people have gone missing in both sides of the country – Balochistan and Sindh”. She added that both the provinces will get their freedom one day.

Speaking at the protest, Lakhu Luhano, general secretary of the WSC said that the missing people in Sindh should not feel alone. “They should know that we are with them”. He appealed to the world to stop Pakistan from kidnapping people – an act that is happening in broad daylight and which has been recorded by cameras as well.

The WSC also highlighted the forced abduction of Nazia Khoso and her daughter in Kandhkot, Sindh, a fortnight back and asked Pakistan to release them.

Balochistan province borders Afghanistan and Iran to Pakistan’s west while Sindh province borders India in the east. The two regions of Pakistan harbours different ethnicities of people who have been waging a struggle for independence from Pakistan. The Baloch and Sindhis have been collaborating with each other in battling Pakistan, including rebel groups joining hands to attack Pakistani and Chinese projects in the two regions.

Two days before the WSC protest, the Baloch National Movement (BNM) UK held a protest near Sunak’s residence at 10 Downing Street in the heart of London. The focus of their protest was the enforced disappearances of Baloch youth, women and children – which the Baloch allege has increased after the Shari Baloch suicide bombing incident.

The BNM alleged that last year 629 people were forcibly disappeared, 195 killed extrajudicially and 187 people tortured by various Pakistani agencies.

The recent abduction of Baloch nationalist Mahal Baloch by Pakistan’s Counter-Terrorism Department (CTD) from the house of a relative Bibi Gul – the chairperson of the HR Council of Balochistan (HRCB) – a human rights group based in Europe and Balochistan, has added duel to the Baloch fire. Protests have broken out in all of Balochistan against her abduction on suspicions of Mahal being a suicide bomber.

Pakistan finds itself in the global limelight not only due to the activities of Baloch and Sindhi nationalists but also because of its state of affairs – rising terrorism, food shortages, massive fuel price hikes as well as a collapsing economy. Industries are shutting down over power shortages while its foreign exchange reserves are sufficient to import goods for barely three weeks.

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