A 15-year-old Baloch girl was allegedly taken into custody by Pakistani armed forces during a midnight raid in the industrial town of Balochistan’s Hub Chowki and has been missing since, local sources and rights groups said on Saturday.
Sources said military personnel and intelligence officials raided a house near the Daroo Hotel area at around midnight on 22 November and detained the teenager, identified as Nasreena, daughter of Dilawar Baloch, originally from Awaran. They said she was transferred to an undisclosed location, and her family said they had not been informed of her whereabouts, nor had she been produced before any police station or court.
Pakistani authorities have not commented on the incident.
Rights groups and Baloch activists said the case reflected a growing pattern in which Baloch women and girls were being subjected to enforced disappearance.
In a statement on X, activist and Baloch Yakjehti Committee (BYC) leader Dr Sabiha Baloch said Nasreena’s detention indicated a “deliberate pattern” in which state institutions were targeting Baloch women.
“A 15-year-old girl was forcibly disappeared after a midnight raid… These incidents show deliberate actions by security institutions,” she said. She added that the disappearance of 23-year-old student Mahjabeen Baloch, who was taken into custody in Quetta five months ago, remained unresolved, saying: “The silence is intentional. It signals a new norm where Baloch women can be detained and disappeared without process.”
The Baloch Women Forum (BWF) condemned the incident as “unacceptable,” saying the raid and arrest of a minor had “shaken societal norms.” In a statement, BWF said Baloch women had increasingly faced threats, detentions and enforced disappearances in recent years, citing previous cases including Sayad Bibi, Sakeena, Mahal Baloch, Noor Khatoon and Asma of Khuzdar. “Adding Baloch women to this grave crime is fuelling the already burning fire of hatred, deprivation and stress,” the BWF said.
The rights organization Baloch Voice for Justice (BVJ) also condemned the disappearance and called for urgent intervention from international human rights bodies.
In its statement, BVJ said the targeted raid and abduction of a minor highlighted the “intensifying pattern of repression faced by Baloch women and girls.” The group urged the United Nations and global civil society organizations to act immediately to ensure the protection of Baloch women from “state-led intimidation, harassment and abductions,” and called for the immediate and safe recovery of Nasreena Baloch.