Forcibly disappeared persons should be produced before courts – BHRO

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The spokesperson of BHRO, in a statement, has said that the state authorities have confessed many times that the missing persons are in their custody.

BHRO’s statement was issued in the reaction of Director General of ISPR, Major General Asif Ghafoor’s statement in which he claimed that not all missing persons are in their custody, some were killed and some fled to Afghanistan.

The spokesperson said that the military should also provide the number of enforced disappeared persons in their custody, and should clarify under which legal process they are being held and under which state law their whereabouts are undisclosed and they are being deprived of their legal rights to defend themselves. On the contrary, the detainees are subjected to inhuman torture and in many cases, their mutilated bodies were found dumped.

Many Baloch political activists including social media activists, students, laborers, and farmers are missing for a decade now and their families are peacefully protesting for years from the platform of Voice for Baloch Missing and Baloch Human Rights Organization for the safe recovery of their loved ones but in these 10 years none of the disappeared people were presented in courts. Instead, mutilated bodies of thousands of enforced disappeared persons were dumped and hundreds of them end up in mass graves.

BHRO stated that many Baloch mothers and sisters including Sammi Baloch, Seema Baloch, Ali Haider Baloch and Farzana Majeed Baloch have been continuously demanding in protests to present their loved ones in courts that if they have committed any crimes then punish them accordingly but till now, the state authorities in Balochistan have neither presented a single person of enforced disappearances in the court nor acted according to the law and constitution.

BHRO maintained in its statement that the state officials have claimed in various statements that the issue of enforced disappeared persons has been resolved to a large extent. But on the contrary of the state claims, security forces are continuously abducting more people everyday.

The spokesperson further said that the families of missing persons are living a miserable life spending most years of their life protesting for the recovery of their loved ones but instead of listening to them, the state authorities are trying to suppress them. If the state authorities have sympathy and can understand the pain through which the families of missing persons of Balochistan are going through, then they must bring the missing persons to the courts and hold accountable those who are involved in the enforced disappearances practices in Balochistan.

BHRO said, “We appeal to the state officials that disappearing people in Balochistan is a serious issue and must be resolved, it is necessary to stop the enforced disappearances and present them in courts and relieve the families from the constant pain they had been going through.