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Balochistan: what Wikileaks reveals (the case of John Solecki)

Wikileaks cables related to the kidnapping of UNHCR Office Director John Solecki in Balochistan reveal, to borrow a phrase from Milan Kundera, a "cemetery of missed opportunities" for both Pakistan and the United States.

The kidnapping of UNHCR Office Director John Solecki in Quetta and the tragic killing of his driver on February 2, 2009, stunned all who follow developments in Balochistan. Initially, the United Nations struggled to determine whether "Mr. Solecki was attacked for his UN affiliation, his citizenship or both." Originally police believed a terrorist group was responsible and by February 12, U.S. Ambassador to the UN Susan Rice could report that Pakistan PR Abdullah Hussain Harron, had "intimated that they were Baluch who were trying to make a political statement."

Except for the 1980s kidnapping of MI6 agent Alastair Crooke, whose experience seems almost romantic in tone and in retrospect, abduction is not part of the modus operandi of Baloch militants. Balochistan's militant groups are well- established and branded; their acronyms familiar (BLA, BLF, BRP, etc.), so all with whom we spoke in 2009 were openly skeptical of the claims of responsibility phoned in by the hitherto unknown Balochistan Liberation United Front. Even its acronym--BLUF--led this writer to consider that this was all but a bluff.

While U.S. government intelligence agencies may now know who organized and supported the BLUF, this set of Wikileaks cables does not reveal that information. What it does expose, however, are the many unsubstantiated allegations tossed about by Pakistani officials during the two months of Solecki's captivity, as well as U.S. Government distrust of any claims made by the Baloch against the Government of Pakistan.

BLUF demands were first communicated days after the kidnapping when a spokesperson called various news offices in Quetta to announce: "We have kidnapped John to highlight the plight of the Baloch people in Pakistan who are being treated by the State worse than slaves. If the UN does not intervene and ensure the release of 6,000 missing Baloch people, including 141 women, and resolve the Baloch issue according to the Geneva conventions, we will kill John . . . The reason it took us five days to claim responsibility was to make sure that we reach at a safe place before claiming responsibility. We are at a safe place now." The spokesman added his "organization had no links with other Baloch armed groups, but supported their cause and it would continue its operations in the future."

In a February 19 cable, U.S. Ambassador to Pakistan Anne Patterson notes that Mir Shahak Baloch, a "self-proclaimed spokesman for the Baloch Liberation United Front (BLUF)" called reporters to claim responsibility and issue the group's statement: "Instead of cooperation with us, the government is trying to move the missing persons to more secretive places," Baloch said. "We want the UN to formulate a team and come to Balochistan to see the actual situation about the missing persons."

To secure Mr. Solecki's release, a number of tactics were discussed in the cable of February 19. One included having Pakistan TV "air a report suggesting the kidnapping brought shame on the Balochi people and jeopardized the UN's humanitarian work in Balochistan." There is some irony in this given that for years one of the main grievances of Baloch activists had been that the UN (and other aid and human rights organizations) did NOT address the needs of the Baloch in Balochistan, but was rather in Balochistan to help non-Baloch refugees, for example, the Afghans. For years the Baloch have publicly pleaded for investigative journalists and aid workers to visit Balochistan to document the situation there. It bears repeating that it is the Government of Pakistan that denies access to Balochistan, not the Baloch people. And this much is confirmed by Wikileaks in relation to UNICEF pleas for access to Baloch IDPs.

Throughout the crisis, Interior Minister Rahman Malik continued to insist that Brahamdagh Bugti was behind the kidnapping and that the Bugtis and Marris were colluding in the case. Malik deviously "proposed efforts to split them by telling each side the other was privately accusing it of kidnapping Solecki. He also urged that the U.S. (through intermediaries) begin to threaten Bugti with extradition to Pakistan in the event something happened to Solecki."

Note: Since the killing of Baloch tribal elder Nawab Akbar Bugti, Pakistan has dreamed of arresting Brahamdagh Bugti, grandson of Nawab Bugti and favorite bête noire of Pakistan, glamorously profiled recently in the New York Times. Similarly, Pakistan labored to extradite Baloch activists living in the UK. In 2007 it engineered the quid pro quo arrest of Hairbyar Marri and Faiz Baluch who were tried in London and ultimately freed in early 2009.

On March 9, a cable titled Balochistan Heats Up reveals that the U.S. government was still clearly in the dark regarding the whereabouts of John Solecki, as well as who his abductors were. Consul General Stephen Fakan reported that "fugitive" Baloch nationalist Brahamdagh Bugti threatened to retaliate against the ruling Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) government for failing to end Pakistan military operations in Balochistan and noted that this threat followed the calling off of the ceasefire with the government of Pakistan by three other militant Baloch nationalist groups--all of whom "professed ignorance about the origins of the Balochistan Liberation United Front (BLUF)." (1)

Fakan adds that the nationalists "continue to accuse the GOP of committing atrocities (unverified by Post) partially as a means to inflame tribal sentiment." In fact, cable after cable recites the mantra that the Baloch have "offered no evidence" for any claims they make regarding treatment by the Government of Pakistan. Yet even as early as 2006, Charge d'Affaires Peter W. Bodde writes: "The GOP's [Government of Pakistan's] security operations in Balochistan have been accompanied by well-documented reports from human rights activists of disappearances, reprisals, property seizures and other human rights violations against nationalist politician, Baloch journalists and extended family members of nationalist fighters." And in a 2008 meeting with Senator Russ Feingold, Ambassador Anne Patterson reports that then PPP Co-Chairman Asif Zardari "contends that future economic growth depends on political stability, faulting Musharraf for engaging in a costly 'three front war' with Balochistan, India and Afghanistan."

The recent rash of Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International reports regarding alleged human rights abuses committed by Pakistan's security agencies makes it less likely U.S. government officials can ignore Baloch claims, but realistically, to this day, an individual Baloch stands virtually no chance of proving his or her claims, even if he could get a case heard in one of Pakistan's barely functioning and Teflon-coated courts. While the scale of abductions increased dramatically in 2010 and 2011, even in 2009, the Baloch had already witnessed abductions they duly reported at great risk to themselves. The families of victims tried to file FIRs with police departments who routinely turned them away. They addressed press conferences. They posted photos of the tortured and dead bodies turning up at roadsides and built websites (blocked in Pakistan) to try to reach the international community. With no authorities willing and/or able to carry out investigations, and with most leads pointing squarely at Pakistan's own security agencies (in particular, the Frontier Corps who have been identified at many of the abduction crime scenes), the Baloch are at an impasse. This inability to get anyone in a position of power and authority to pay attention to their plight--this Catch 22 situation--is one reason the BLUF kidnapped the unfortunate John Solecki.

One of the most disheartening paragraphs in this tranche of diplomatic cables is the following observation: "Most of the nationalist leaders that Post has spoken with have taken pains to emphasize their common interests with the USG [U.S. government], such as opposition to the Taliban and other violent religious extremists, while downplaying differences such as their tacit approval of armed militant nationalist groups. Post believes much of this discourse, possibly coordinated among the groups, may be tailored to gain USG support in their fight against the GOP. Many Baloch, in Pakistan's conspiracy-driven society, routinely accuse GOP intelligence services of actively supporting the Islamic militants as a counterbalance to nationalist organizations, without offering any evidence."

Given what is known of Pakistan's military long-running support for Taliban and terrorists, this conclusion is disappointing, especially as any history of the Baloch will identify the Baloch as secular (see Selig Harrison's "In Afghanistan's Shadow, Baluch nationalism and Soviet temptations," for example). This "discourse" was not "tailored to gain USG support," but rather to justify why such support should be contemplated. Both the Pakistan and United States governments, at their own peril, ignore this outreach. In the 1980s, when Pakistan's troops were dispatched to rescue MI6's kidnapped Crooke, they found him sitting on a rock reading a book. He famously refused to leave until his Baloch captors had a chance to air their grievances. One wishes U.S. and Pakistani governments would take their cues from Mr. Crooke, for even as late as 2009, Baloch militant groups were still demanding autonomy, not independence from Pakistan.

John Solecki was finally released on April 4, 2009. He was found 30 miles from Quetta in Mastung district following a call to a Quetta news agency. For the Baloch, however, events started to spiral out of control.

On April 8, the "mutilated bodies of Baloch National Movement (BNM) General Secretary Ghulam Mohammad" and two other Baloch nationalists, Lala Munir and Sher Mohammad Baloch, were found near the southern Balochistan city of Turbat. Victim Ghulam Mohammad had been tasked with representing "Baloch interests in discussions with the GOP about the nationalists' demands for accountability of alleged missing persons" during Solecki's captivity. Consul General Fakan writes that all Baloch parties call for an official inquiry, with several "specifying that they wanted an official UN (instead of GOP) investigation." Once again, Fakan densely remarks "there is no real evidence to support this claim" of security agency involvement and wrongly predicts that "the deaths will most likely not destabilize the province." He rightly concludes, however, that "it may add to the list of perceived injustices the nationalists will probably point to in their ongoing struggle with the GOP."

On April 27, in Balochistan - What May Be Behind The Current Unrest And Possible Implications For USG Shipments, Fakan still muses about what "may" be behind the current unrest and notes that "what is singular about these protests is their duration and breadth" and accurately concludes that "the recent murders were an open affront to Balochis and have dashed most hopes for reconciliation." He quotes a respected female Baloch intellectual who "described the killings of the three Baloch leaders as a turning point for many Baloch" and warned that "she had watched many young Baloch nationalists grow increasingly disillusioned with the promises of the GOP and they were moving towards militancy."

Fakan's last post related to the kidnapping closes with an assessment of what this all means for U.S. government shipments to Afghanistan. Cynics will observe that the interests of war and commerce all too often trump those of human rights.

In her final post related to the subject, Ambassador Anne Patterson writes: "Though John Solecki refused to say anything while still in Pakistan, in Bagram he told accompanying FBI agents that he believed there were three reasons for his release. First, Solecki said he had played up the fact that he was sick and that he would die, a situation that BLUF wanted to avoid. Also, Solecki believed that Nawab Marri did have some influence over the BLUF and the ultimate release. Lastly, Solecki said that the BLUF was just getting tired of having to deal with him. The BLUF treated him fairly well and they were not seasoned kidnappers. According to Solecki, the BLUF told him they 'had more important work to do.'"

Patterson closes with this observation: "Comment: The safe release of Amcit John Solecki is a relief for USG, UN, and GOP officials. We were initially skeptical that the kidnapping was, indeed, the work of Baloch nationalists since hostage-taking had not previously been part of their modus operandi. While this initial foray into the kidnapping business may not have yielded much in the way of ransom, it did yield a rich trove of sympathetic attention to the Baloch cause and at least passing GOP commitment to redress of Baloch grievances. Regrettably, in the absence of continued efforts to improve conditions in Balochistan, this may be sufficient to encourage further Baloch kidnapping in the future. End comment."

Over two years have passed since the closing Wikileaks remarks on this episode were penned. The absence of "continued efforts to improve conditions in Balochistan" did not encourage further kidnappings, as Ambassador Patterson worried, but conditions in Balochistan did, in fact, continue to deteriorate. Sadly, they show no signs of improving.

(1) Fakan's post notes that the reason the three militant groups (The BRA, the BLA and the BLF) ended their 2008 unilateral ceasefire in January, was because "they claimed the GOP had not met their demands (an end to military operations, the release of political prisoners, accountability for alleged missing persons, and autonomy for the province)."


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