Three Baloch youngsters, identified as Yasir s/o Mohammad Ayub, Bahadur Khan s/o Haider Khan and Ghulam Qadir s/o Huzoor Bux have been reportedly abducted from Khuzdar and Kalat districts of Balochistan. As per reports, all of them were arrested by the security forces and shifted to unknown locations.
According to sources, Yasir Baloch was abducted from Talawan, Zehri during a raid at his home. Women and children were beaten up by the security personnel and valuables were looted, sources added.
In a separate incident two Baloch students, residents of Zehri, Khuzdar, were allegedly abducted by the officials of Counter Terrorism Department (CTD) from Kaputhu. There are reports that CTD officials opened fire on both Bahadur Khan and Ghulam Qadir and later took them into custody in injured condition.
On the other hand, CTD have claimed that they have arrested two armed men in exchange of fire. However, local sources have disputed CTD’s claims, saying that the ‘both youngsters were unarmed, and officials opened fire indiscriminately’.
CTD has been accused of targeting previously abducted persons in fake encounters and arresting unarmed civilians and labelling them as militants later.
The Counter Terrorism Department or CTD in Balochistan was introduced around 2010 after another police department CID was revamped. The new force was the brainchild of Pakistani military and had been implemented under National Action Plan or NAP. The force is sold as the most disciplined and efficient wing of the security apparatus. Its personnel receive training directly from Special Service Group, the Navy Seal or SAS equivalent of Pakistan Army. But in Balochistan the group is known as encounter specialists due to sheer number of fake encounters the group is accused of.
Baloch political and human rights organisations fear the Pakistani forces have changed tactics. The notorious “kill and dump” policy has been morphed into fake encounters. The forcibly disappeared persons are now being killed by CTD in such encounters to “deceive the international monitoring bodies”, these groups claim.