Sammi Deen Baloch, the daughter of the missing Dr. Deen Muhammad Baloch, held a press conference with her younger sister, Mehlab Deen Baloch, and several other human rights activists at the Karachi Press Club on Friday to mark the 15th year of her father’s ‘enforced disappearance.’ Addressing the press conference, Sammi Deen Baloch asked state institutions if her father is alive or dead, and whether she and her sister are orphans.
Other notable participants in the press conference included Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP) chairman Asad Iqbal Butt, Lala Wabab, among several others.
Dr. Deen Muhammad Baloch, a medical doctor by profession, was also a political activist and a close aide of Ghulam Muhammad Baloch in the revival of non-parliamentary and pro-liberationist politics. He was a member of the central committee of the Baloch National Movement, a pro-independence political movement that advocates for the independence of Balochistan. He was one of the countless victims of the state’s policy of forcibly disappearing Baloch vocal activists to silence them, starting from the Musharraf era and continuing to this day. He was picked up on the night of June 28, 2009, and remains missing to this day.
Speaking to the media, Sammi Deen Baloch said that ‘enforced disappearances’ have become a grave human rights issue in Balochistan. She stated that the list of Baloch missing persons only keeps growing, and the state institutions show no seriousness towards finding a solution.
Recalling her father’s ‘enforced disappearance,’ Sammi Deen Baloch said that her father was forcibly detained by Pakistan intelligence agencies from Ornach, Khuzdar, where he was on duty. Intelligence agents dressed in civilian clothing apprehended him and took him away without any explanation or justification. “It’s been fifteen years,” she said, “and we still don’t know anything about his whereabouts or condition. We still don’t know if he is alive or not.”
She mentioned that there is a police station and a camp of the Frontier Corps (FC) near the place from where her father was ‘abducted,’ yet he was taken away under their noses. She emphasized that her father was a government employee, which makes it even more mandatory for government institutions, the judiciary, and other law enforcement agencies to play their part in his recovery.
“But instead of doing so, the government institutions are only harassing us,” she said. Sammi Deen Baloch shared that she has knocked on the doors of the high courts and even the Supreme Court of Pakistan in search of justice, but to no avail. She stated that the apex court dismissed her father’s case, claiming he had fled to foreign countries or joined the Baloch guerrilla fighters, without any evidence to back these claims.
Sammi Deen Baloch further added that she also approached the missing persons’ commission established by the government of Pakistan to investigate the cases of all the missing persons, but that also didn’t help. She said the commission asked rude and irrelevant questions, and bullied them to give up their struggle for the recovery of their loved ones.
“We have done everything we could – we went to the courts, we went to the missing persons commission, we even protested on the streets countless times, but none of that has worked,” she said. Sammi Deen Baloch mentioned that she has marched twice, once on foot in 2014. She and other families of Baloch missing persons protested thrice in Islamabad for the safe release of their loved ones, but their pleas were met with violence and harassment. They were baton-charged, tear-gassed, water-cannoned in winter nights, and thrown into prisons for asking for their rights. She said that the families of Baloch missing persons are harassed and their advocacy is labeled as ‘anti-state’ by the state’s propaganda machinery.
Dr. Deen Muhammad’s prolonged disappearance has severely impacted his family too. In the past 15 years, his father and siblings have passed away without a final glimpse of him. Sammi Deen Baloch said that until their last breath, they were waiting for his return, but they never got to see that happen.
She asked the state institutions if her father is alive or dead, whether she and her siblings are orphans, and if her mother is widowed. She said that she has the full right to demand answers to these questions from the state institutions.
Even after 15 years, she still does not know why her father was picked up. She asked the state institutions to show courage and inform them of her father’s crime and if he is alive or was killed in the state’s torture cells. She said that the state’s doors of justice have been closed on her family, and she will now take her message to international human rights groups and institutions for justice who will hopefully hold the Pakistani state accountable.
She asked the attending journalists and others to be part of the campaign. She said the campaign needs all the voices it can find, and people from every walk of life can be part of it. She expressed hope that her father would one day return, but as the years pass by, she gets more anxious about his well-being. She said that she only wants one answer – whether her father is alive or died in custody.
The Baloch Doctors’ Forum Balochistan echoed similar sentiments. The group called for the safe recovery of Dr. Deen Muhammad Baloch in a media statement, saying that his detention is not only a grave human rights violation but a collective punishment for his family and Baloch society as a whole.
The group described him as a pro-poor individual who dedicated his entire life to the service of humanity. This is evident from the fact that when he was detained, he was on duty. The group called for his safe recovery and urged people from other professions to raise their voices for his release.