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| A tale from the dungeons |
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Monday, January 26, 2009
The Hong Kong-based Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) has come up with a shocking story that reveals the extent of brutality, depravation and discrimination in our land. The organization, in a statement, has given an account of the brutal rape of a Baloch woman who landed up in the custody of military authorities. Journalist and TV producer Munir Mengal, who himself spent over eight months in detention after being whisked away from Karachi airport and joining the ranks of the ‘disappeared’, has said (also recounted by Rahimullah Yusufzai in one of his columns for these pages) that he encountered the hapless woman at a detention centre in Karachi, where she was stripped naked and hurled into his cell. He was tortured when he refused to rape her – a fate she had already suffered multiple times at the hands of her captors.
The case has not figured prominently in the local media. There has not been any official opinion either on what happened and why. But there should be an investigation to uncover the facts. The matter goes beyond the abuse of rights of a single woman – even though that in itself is shocking. It also reflects existing attitudes towards the people of Balochistan and the blatant misuse of power by the military. It is these factors that have played a huge part in stirring up the unrest and anger we see everywhere in Balochistan. There is too, in the story, a distinct echo of events that happened in another time, another place. Stories of the deliberate demeaning and abuse of women as a means to punish an entire population, of similar torture and illegal captivity, were heard too from East Pakistan. We all know where the sequence of events that unfolded there ended. This must not be allowed to happen again. It can be prevented only by ensuring outrages of the kind we have now heard about are never allowed to occur again. We demand a full inquiry made into the allegations and measures taken against anyone found responsible for the terrible acts committed.
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ISSN 1563-9479 
