Pakistan: Amnesty International condemns Baloch protesters, demands authority to drop charges against them

Amnesty International asked Pakistani authorities to drop charges against the arrested people.

The march began after people in the country’s southeastern town of Turbat accused officials of the provincial Counter-Terrorism Department (CTD) of killing 24-year-old Balach Baloch in November after arresting him on charges of possessing five kilograms of explosive material, reported Arab News.

Baloch’s family and members of the civil society held a sit-in in Turbat for about two weeks to protest what they called his “custodial death” and demanded action against the CTD officials, the newspaper reported.

The protesters, which included women and children, participated in a 766-kilometer-long march to Quetta earlier this month and then decided to move to Islamabad.

Amnesty International said 20 people were detained during the march.

In a statement posted on X, Amnesty said: "@Amnesty strongly condemns the arrest and detention of at least 20 participants of the Baloch march on 17 December in Dera Ghazi Khan, Punjab."

"The protestors, many of them women and families of the forcibly disappeared, peacefully held a sit-in and, subsequently, started a long march from Balochistan to Islamabad demanding justice and accountability after the extrajudicial killing of Balach Mola Bakhsh and three others by the Pakistan Counterterrorism Department (CTD) in Turbat, Balochistan on 23 November 2023. Balach, a 24-year-old Baloch man, was taken by law enforcement on 29 October and was in CTD custody on remand when extrajudicially executed," read the post.

"The protestors have been released, however, 3 separate cases against the organizers and participants have been filed," advocacy group said.