Quetta, Sep 29 (IANS): Human rights body Baloch Yakjehti Committee (BYC) strongly condemned the Pakistani authorities for evicting thousands of people in Balochistan’s Gwadar district under the pretext of a security threat, describing the move as an “occupation of Baloch land and a state assault on Baloch survival”.
“Sardasht area located near Shadi Kaur region in Gwadar, is an ancient Baloch settlement where nearly three thousand people have lived for generations. This entire area, including Reke Bazaar, Syed Muhammad Bazaar, and Tolgo, serves as the centre of the local people’s social and economic life. Today, the state is displacing precisely these people from their homes, lands, and ancestral territory under the guise of a security threat,” the BYC stated.
“This justification of security is merely a pretext. The very state constitutionally obligated to protect citizens’ lives and property is the one evicting them from their land. If there is a genuine threat in the area, it is the state’s duty to provide protection to the people, not to render them homeless. Evicting three thousand people from their homes does not make them safe; rather, it turns them into refugees, unemployed, and displaced within their own homeland,” it added.
According to the BYC, labelling an entire population as a threat and displacing them from their homes amounts to collective punishment. The rights body said that when communities are displaced and their land cleared in the name of security, under the banner of protection, it becomes clear that the “state’s target is not some threat, but Baloch land itself”.
“What is happening in Sardasht is not an isolated incident but a link in the chain of a systematic state policy underway in Balochistan, particularly along the Makran coast. The land and coastline of Gwadar are being sacrificed to so-called development projects and the interests of powerful lobbies, while the Baloch people are seen as obstacles and systematically removed,” the BYC stated
“Sometimes it’s plans to fence off Gwadar city, sometimes checkpoints at every step, sometimes depriving fishermen of their own sea, sometimes restrictions on border employment, and now evicting people from their homes — these are all different phases of the same policy,” it noted.
Expressing grave concern, the BYC said that Pakistan’s policy is aimed at gaining complete control over Balochistan’s land and resources, reducing the Baloch people to a minority in their own homeland and eroding the economic and social foundations of Baloch society.
It called for an immediate halt to the evictions in Sardasht and withdrawal of all related orders, while demanding that displaced families be allowed to return home with dignity and receive full compensation for their losses.
