LAHORE/ISLAMABAD: A Pakistani ethnic rights group drew over 8,000 people to a rally in Lahore on Sunday, despite pressure from security officials to call off the event focusing on human rights violations in areas bordering Afghanistan.
The leader of the Pashtun Tahafuz Movement (PTM), student activist Manzoor Pashteen, delivered an address criticizing the country’s powerful military and its actions in the majority ethnic Pashtun Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA).
“I urge professional soldiers not to follow the command of the generals and brigadiers. Refuse to obey their orders because they (generals) can get you killed like they did with people of Waziristan and other parts of the country,” Pashteen said.
The North and South Waziristan areas of FATA were the site of large military operations in 2009 and 2014 after the Pakistan Taliban took control of swathes of territory in the region.
Waziristan is still affected by media restrictions, limiting the ability of journalists to travel there, and activists say that has contributed to portrayal of the Pashtun population as wedded to backward tribal customs and maintaining close ties to militant groups.
On Saturday, five PTM members were taken from their hotel by Lahore police and told they did not have permission to hold a rally, organization leader Ali Wazir told Reuters.
“We have come to Lahore so we can share our pain and suffering with people,” Wazir said.
“No one here knows what is happening in FATA.”
Police confirmed five activists were picked up but did not give any reasons for their detention.
PTM emerged after the January killing by police of Pashtun youth Naqeebullah Mehsud in Karachi sparked nationwide condemnation and demonstrations attracting several thousand people.
The organization has drawn the ire of the country’s armed forces.
Pakistan’s army chief Qamar Javed Bajwa said at an April 12 meeting with dignitaries that “no anti-state agenda in the garb of engineered protests” will not be allowed to succeed, the military’s public relations department said in a statement.
He did not name PTM when making the comments.
At least two universities in Pakistan canceled talks related to Pashtun rights last week after receiving calls from security officials, faculties at both institutions said.
A faculty member at Lahore’s Punjab University was fired after being criticized for participating in an event attended by Pashteen and promoting left-leaning ideas with students, associate professor Ammar Ali Jan said.
The university has said Jan was removed after failing to complete employment paperwork, despite teaching there for over a semester.
Midway through the rally, sewage water was released onto the grounds of Lahore’s Mochi Gate where the protest was being held but participants remained undeterred.
Local government officials declined to comment on how the wastewater was released.
Pakistani rights group attracts 8,000 to rally despite state pressure
Pakistani rights group attracts 8,000 to rally despite state pressure
- PTM came into prominence after the killing of Pashtun youth Naqeebullah Mehsud by police in Karachi
- “I urge professional soldiers not to follow the command of the generals and brigadiers,” says rights group leader Manzoor Pashteen
Tanzania opposition says 2,000 killed in election violence
- Opposition party Chadema’s deputy chairperson John Heche said Tanzania witnessed “mass killings of more than 2,000 people and over 5,000 injured in the space of just one week“
- The violence was carried out “with direct involvement of the state“
DAR ES SALAM: Tanzania’s main opposition party on Thursday said more than 2,000 people were killed in a week of election violence, calling for sanctions against officials it accused of crimes against humanity.
President Samia Suluhu Hassan was declared the winner of October 29 polls with 98 percent of the vote, but her government was accused of rigging the polls and overseeing a campaign of murders and abductions of her critics that sparked nationwide protests and riots.
Opposition party Chadema’s deputy chairperson John Heche told reporters that Tanzania witnessed “mass killings of more than 2,000 people and over 5,000 injured in the space of just one week.”
He said the violence was carried out “with direct involvement of the state” and that it amounted to “crimes against humanity.”
Previous opposition counts had put the deaths at more than 1,000. The government has not given a death toll.
Heche urged the international community to “impose sanctions on all individuals involved in planning and executing these acts of criminality and crimes against humanity.”
In a live online broadcast, he said those responsible should be subjected to travel bans, including restrictions on their families.
Heche also said the unrest triggered a surge of people fleeing the country, alongside “the abduction and enforced disappearance of hundreds of civilians.”
Chadema further accused security units of carrying out rapes, torture and “gruesome killings,” and of engaging in widespread looting and arbitrary arrests.
The party urged authorities to return the bodies of those killed so families could bury them.
Authorities have continued to stifle dissent, with planned protests earlier this week seeing empty streets and a significant security presence.
Hassan last week justified the killings, saying it was necessary to prevent the overthrow of the government.
“The force that was used corresponds to the situation at hand,” she said in a speech.
Hassan has formed an inquiry commission into the violence, which the opposition says includes only government loyalists, instead calling for an independent investigation.
