The United States over the past weeks has sent mixed signals to Balochistan, eliciting reactions from Baloch activists while kicking up a diplomatic war of words with Pakistan.
The simmering issue of a Balochi nation was brought to the front burner recently with U.S. Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-CA) introducing a resolution calling for a Balochi right to self-determination. Two other Republican lawmakers, Louie Gohmert of Texas, and Steve King of Iowa, also signed on as original co-sponsors of the bill.
In filing the resolution, Rohrabacher said, “The Balochi, like other nations of people, have an innate right to self-determination,” adding, “The political and ethnic discrimination they suffer is tragic and made more so because America is financing and selling arms to their oppressors in Islamabad.”
Earlier, Rohrabacher, chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations, held a congressional hearing on human rights violations in Balochistan.
Addressing a first-ever hearing on human rights violation in Balochistan, Christine Fair, assistant professor at Georgetown University, said, “The problem goes back to Pakistan's abuse of human rights served our interests, and so we are kind of coming to this late in the game, that we are trying to ask the Pakistanis to clean up their act after we have given them literally a blank check for about a decade.”
Citing it as “an absolutely appalling situation, even by Pakistani standards,” Ali Dayan Hasan, Pakistan director of the Asia division of Human Rights Watch, told an audience of lawmakers, academics and journalists, “Certainly when you are operating in Balochistan you do see that the military in many ways behaves like a brutal occupying military -- that is its behavior.”
The Pakistan army brutalized the population in the region with the aid of American weapons, T. Kumar of Amnesty International told the hearing audience. “What is happening to Baloch people, it is the kill-and-dump operation, it is a terror mechanism that the Pakistani military and the intelligence officers use to terrorize the local population," he said.
The Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organization (UNPO), an international, nonviolent, and democratic membership organization, quoted Balochistan National Party’s president Sardar Akhtar Mengal as applauding the congressional hearing on the Balochistan issue and the House subcommittee’s concerns regarding the appalling human rights emergency in Balochistan and endorsing the Baloch people's right to national self-determination.
But the focus of the congressional Hearing on the role played by the Pakistani government since it crushed an attempt by Balochis to regain independence in 1947-48 didn’t go down well in Islamabad, where angry voices lambasted the hearing, calling it a voice of the vested interests against the territorial integrity of Pakistan.
With U.S.-Pakistan relations at a nadir, the State Department hastily tried to separate the Obama administration from the sentiments expressed at the hearing. Victoria Nuland, the State Department spokeswoman, told journalists, “This is a complex issue. We strongly believe that the best way forward is for all the parties to resolve their differences through peaceful dialogue.”
To ward off angry retorts from Islamabad, the U.S. embassy there issued a statement reiterating the U.S. stand respecting Pakistani sovereignty.
“Members of congress introduce legislation on numerous foreign affairs topics and these bills do not in any way imply U.S. government endorsement of any particular policy,” it said, adding, “The Department of State does not typically comment on pending legislation, but it is not the policy of the Administration to support independence for Balochistan.”
These mixed signals were received with an angry reaction from Baloch activists in Washington, DC, with Ahmar Mustikhan, founder of American Friends of Balochistan, terming it a violation of the American legislative process under pressure from the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) of the Pakistani military.
Mustikan said that the secular Baloch people are looking forward to a 50-Year Treaty of Peace & Friendship with the U.S. and Afghanistan, “but your poorly worded statement has dashed our hopes.”
Mustikhan hoped the State Department would not undermine the American legislative process that guarantees freedom and liberty not only in the U.S. but around the world.
Highlighting Balochistan's geo-strategic location with vast natural resources, political pundits and regional observers are expecting more international community-facilitated action while Pakistan works to appease a volatile situation there.
Balochistan, the westernmost province of Pakistan, is bordered by Iran on the west, by Afghanistan to the northwest, by North-West Frontier and Punjab provinces to the northeast and east, by Sindh province to the southeast and by the Arabian Sea to the south.
http://www.allheadlinenews.com/articles/90073075?Clouds+of+uncertainty+gather+over+colliding+Balochistan+statements#ixzz1mw3xeHlU
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