Human Rights in Balochistan: A role for the European Union?

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Abstract

On the 14th of December 2015, according to a Balochwarna News report from the 17th, Pakistani security forces raided and carried out a house-to-house search operation in New Kahan (Quetta, Balochistan) after the burial of Surriya Begum, the wife of a prominent Baloch tribal leader. The security forces not only intimidated and harassed the local population, it also arrested several individuals. Furthermore, this was not an isolated incident, since operations were being reported in several parts of Balochistan; in the following days two people were allegedly killed and a dozen where abducted. These kinds of operations are not a novel phenomenon. On the 16th of December, Pakistani news and media outlets such as “The Nation”, reported that security forces had killed at least 204 people and detained 8326 during 1863 operations carried out under the “National Action Plan”, which started on the 16th of December 2014. . Given the context of the aftermath of the attack on the Peshawar School massacre, some might argue that these kinds of actions are part of a new policy; but the Pakistani military forces have a long history of comparable incidents.