Reposted from Asian Human Rights Commission | November 25, 2011 | Release

Please note correction (November 28, 2011): Dr. Bashir (Basheer) Azeem was released approximately 2 months after his abduction.

The bullet riddled bodies of two disappeared persons were found from different parts of the Balochistan province. The bodies have been identified as of Jalil Reki and Seth Younus Baloch both of whom were in the custody of country's notorious intelligence agency, the ISI. Mr. Reki was arrested on February 13, 2009 (three years and three months) along with another activist Dr. Bashir Azeem on the charges of burning Pakistani flags and chanting slogan against the Pakistani flag. Since then their whereabouts were unknown. Dr. Bashir's bullet riddled body was found some time back and body bore marks of torture.

In the case of Reki, the chief minister of Balochistan province himself said to a delegation of human rights activists that Jalil Reki had been arrested by the ISI and he refused to intervene. The delegation met the chief minister just after 15 days of his disappearance (on February 29,2009) and consisted of the chairperson of Defence of Human Rights Pakistan and prominent human rights defender, Mrs. Amina Masood Janjua, the president of Voice for Baloch Missing Persons Mr. Nasrullah Bangulzai Baloch and human rights activist Mr. Muhammad Zafar. Later these persons produced their affidavit before the Supreme Court that Reki is in the custody of ISI and chief minister of Balochistan be asked to confirm his statement but when he was asked to submit his evidence he had not produced it in the court. Please find the affidavits here; affidavit-1, affidavit-2, and affidavit-3.

Mr. Jalil Ahmed Reki Baloch, 35, was abducted by persons in plain clothes on 13 February 2009 during the day. Eye witnesses report that 12 to 15 people emerged from a group of vehicles and pulled Jailil Reki into a pickup truck while he was walking home from Friday prayers, near a girls' school at Chowk Kechi on Saryab Road in Quetta. The vehicles included two jeeps and two pickups with tinted windows and no registration plates.

After his abduction the police refused to file a case against the ISI and it was only after one year of his disappearance that the police filed the first information (FIR) when the Supreme Court ordered all police stations to file FIRs as requested in such cases. The High Court of Balochistan had not acted on the constitutional petition from until the FIR was submitted in court. The court has shown its incapability to face the powerful intelligence agencies. The FIR holds two persons responsible for Jalil's abduction: Major General Saleem Nawaz, Director General of the Frontier Corp (FC) in Balochistan and Brigadier Saad Khattak, the then-head of the ISI in the province. http://www.humanrights.asia/news/urgent-appeals/AHRC-UAC-053-2010/

Reki's uncle, Ali Asghar Bagulzai, was also arrested by the military's intelligence agencies in 2001 and since then he is missing. The then governor and military commander of the province have confirmed that he was with the military but yet his whereabouts are unknown. http://www.humanrights.asia/news/ahrc-news/AHRC-STM-014-2011/

Mr. Seth Mohammad Younus Baloch, an activist of the Baloch Republican Party, went to Iran on June 22 to console a relative over the death of a close relative. He was arrested there on August 16 and handed over to Pakistani intelligence services on August 18. He remained in the custody of intelligence agencies till 23 November when his tortured marked bullet riddled body was found from Panjgor, Balochistan. His family was informed by the FC that he was in the custody of intelligence agencies and he would be released if he is found innocent.

Since January 2010 to to-date more than 315 bodies of missing persons have been found in Balochistan. The kill and dump policy of the security forces in Balochistan has been increased since one year. The family members of the disappeared persons told the supreme court this year that whenever we hear that a dead body is found they rush to see it whether that body is of missing person from the their family. Some militant groups are also taking shelter behind the kill and dump policy of the intelligence agencies and operate to take revenge from other groups and ethnic communities.

The Pakistan has become a dysfunctional state and no rule of law is being observed. The military and its different organizations treat themselves above the law and supra-constitutional. The courts are basically scared of the revenge of military and its Para-military forces that is why they never go probe in the allegations of involvement of military officers in the abduction, disappearances and extra-judicial killings. The family members of the disappeared persons have boycotted the court proceedings as their efforts to seek justice from the courts are futile and they have announced in the Supreme Court they would not attend their petitions filed in the courts.

The Asian Human Rights Commission urges the government and high command of the Pakistan Army to register the cases of extrajudicial cases and torture against Major General Saleem Nawaz, Director General of the Frontier Corp (FC) in Balochistan and Brigadier Saad Khattak,against whom the FIR of abduction of Jalil Reki was registered in February 2010. The chief minister of Balochistan should also be prosecuted for being complicit in disappearances and extra-judicial killings of persons in the custody of law enforcement agencies.