BALOCHISTAN: Bangkok Conference, Declaration

BANGKOK DECLARATION

24 February 2010

We the participants of the International Conference titled “Balochistan Yesterday Today and Tomorrow: Meeting the Challenges”, organized by “Baloch Voice Foundation in Bangkok” on 22-24 February 2010 unanimously;

1. Commit ourselves to the struggle for our just and inalienable rights both as individuals and members of the Baloch community and resolve to put aside all our differences and work together in harmony and in close cooperation towards this end;

2. Pledge to take all measures possible through peaceful means to protect our language, culture and separate identity as Baloch and build a society based on values that affirm human dignity and freedom, emphasise diversity and inter-religious and sectarian harmony, and promote equality and justice;

3. Pay homage to the Baloch sarmarchars (freedom fighters) who have laid down their lives for securing the rights and interests of our community and have inspired us with their self-less devotion to the cause and the courage they have demonstrated to take on the Pakistani Army which is the fifth largest army in the world;

4. Denounce in strongest terms the continuing perpetration of heinous crimes against peace-loving Baloch people by the Pakistani and Iranian armies, which has resulted in one of the worst human rights violations that has largely been ignored and gone unreported in the history of humankind;

5. Call upon the international community and urge it to take note of the crimes being committed against an entire community in the name of ‘national and territorial integration’, and put pressure on the Pakistani state to honour its international commitments in cases involving torture, forced disappearances and ensuring the operation of an impartial justice system;

6. Demand to declare Baloch people kept in custody as ‘prisoners of war’ and to treat them as per the UN Conventions; and establishment of a International War Crimes Tribunal to try the perpetrators of the crimes against the Baloch people; also express our disaffection about the performance of the judiciary of Pakistan in the context of the missing persons and do not expect any justice under this system;


7. Express our deep concerns about the gross indifference and arrogance with which Pakistan has been conducting itself in its mission to reduce Baloch to a minority in their own land, subjugate an entire nation by brute force, seal their future by liquidating its young dynamic and promising leadership, exploit the natural resources of the Baloch lands to fill the coffers of the Pakistan state and its army and perpetuate its colonialism;


8. Hold that Balochistan’s forced accession to Pakistan was in violation of the decision of the elected assembly and was thus an act of historical injustice, where the leaders were coerced into accepting the decision imposed on them by the leadership of the Pakistan state;


9. Take appropriate steps to raise the issue of legality of accession of the Baloch state to Pakistan at the international level;

10. Apprehend that Gwadar will serve as a strategic and financial backbone for the Islamic radicals backed by the state and contribute to regional tension


11. Concerned that the establishments of cantonments and continuous deployment of about 150,000 Pakistani forces will further exacerbate the human rights conditions in Balochistan and perpetuate the genocide being undertaken by the Pakistan state;


12. Record our deep anxiety about the strategy of the Pakistani state to divide the Baloch peoples and weaken their resistance movement by playing on the artificial faultlines (sardars & non-sardars, lower class and upper class, agents of one country or another etc.) created by vested interests;


13. Appeal to the conscience of the Baloch brethren to avoid taking measures that affects the strength of the movement and warn that history will not forgive such actions for ignoring the interests of an entire nation for petty personal considerations;


14. Feel confident that there is enough determination and resolve amongst the Baloch nation to carry the struggle forward in the right direction despite the difficulties on the way, the conspiracies of our enemies, and the despondency setting in at certain levels that it is better to give up and negotiate than fight;


15. Remind our brethren that the ideology of Pakistan will never be in consonance with the secular credentials of Baloch identity, and given the inherent contradictions in the Pakistani state, the persisting domination of the Punjabis in the statecraft and the insipient sense of conceit, dishonesty and deception in its leadership, we have to fight for our sovereignty and independence;

16. Draw attention of the international community to the brazen use of Islamic radicalism against the Baloch in the name of patriotism and nationalism to wipe out the liberal and secular ethos of the Baloch nation and condemn the nexus between the Pakistani military and such militant groups to subdue and suppress the genuine voice of the Baloch people;


17. Consider it the most opportune time for us to come together, take stock of our strengths and weaknesses, put the interests of our nation above our personal or sectional interests and commit ourselves to the collective struggle against a much superior and stronger force that is determined to reduce us to second-class citizens, obliterate our cultural salience and silence our voice of protest for ever;


18. Realise the need for the establishment of a body that will work sincerely in a concerted manner towards effective propagation of our language, culture, our political agenda and our national interests through audio-visual and electronic media and provide a forum for regular exchange of views, ideas, options and strategies which will guide us in our most critical struggle for existence;


19. Thank Baloch Voice Foundation for providing the forum for free and fair exchange of a wide spectrum of Baloch views in a neutral destination like Bangkok and commend its efforts to conceive and launch “Baloch Analysis Committee”, which promises to bring together all shades of Baloch opinion and evolve joint strategies for strengthening the movement for our national liberation and independence;


20. Understand that it is a task of tall order, the resources at our hand are limited and there is an endless conspiracy to undermine our efforts; and hence there is an absolute need to bury our mutual differences and devote ourselves wholeheartedly to the task we have set for ourselves;


21. Decide to turn the initiative taken by the Baloch Voice Foundation into an annual calendar event to facilitate regular exchange of ideas, perspectives and strategies on the state of our unremitting struggle for our inalienable rights; and


22. Continue our struggle for independence together keeping aside our mutual differences.

Balochistan Aajoi Juhd Zindagbath

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