The Islamabad High Court (IHC) heard the case of missing Baloch students on Wednesday, where caretaker Prime Minister Anwaar ul Haq Kakar appeared as a respondent.
Justice Mohsin Akhtar Kayani reminded Kakar that the state institutions are bound by the law and cannot violate the rights of the citizens. He said that the state institutions should know how to run the country without resorting to enforced disappearances.
Kakar argued that the state institutions are not responsible for the missing persons, and blamed the ‘non-state actors’ for the situation in Balochistan. He said that the state is facing an armed rebellion in Balochistan, and that the people who claim to represent the missing persons are not sincere in resolving the issue.
He said that they only provide a few names of the missing persons, while the United Nations has a standard procedure to verify the cases of disappearances.
Justice Kayani asked Kakar if he was implying that the judge himself could face enforced disappearance. Kakar said that he was only giving an example, and that he was using his own name as well.
Kakar also said that it is unfair to accuse the entire state of enforced disappearances, and that the human rights of the people who are killed by the non-state actors are ignored. He said that people are shot dead based on their ethnic or tribal identity, such as ‘Chaudhry’ or ‘Gujjar.’ He said that the non-state actors are not fighting for a noble cause, but for creating a new state. He said that they give 5,000 names of missing persons, but they do not want to solve the issue.
The court remarked that the country is in a state of war, and that the military and other institutions are fighting against the non-state actors. The court also said that it is not providing protection to any non-state actor, and that there is a specific legal procedure to deal with them. The court said that the individuals who are involved in anti-state activities should be produced before the court and prosecuted according to the law.