Lawyers' boycott continues 12 days after Quetta blast

QUETTA: Lawyers continued to boycott the courts on the twelfth day after the ghastly Quetta blast, which killed more than seventy people and injured scores of others. 

Lawyers refused to partake in judicial activities and refrained from appearing in district, sessions and high courts throughout the city. Though judges were present inside the courtrooms, lawyers refused to show up in order to represent their clients. Owing to the lawyers' boycott, judicial activities remained suspended which caused difficulties for people. 

In some cases which were particularly important, the clients themselves showed up in front of the judges and after explaining the reason, requested proceedings to be shifted to the next hearing of the case.

Lawyers have been on a strike ever since August 8, when a deadly bomb blast struck Civil Hospital Quetta. More than seventy people were killed in the attack, mostly lawyers who were present inside the hospital since the body of Balochistan Bar Association President Bilal Anwar Kasi had been brought in. Bilal Anwar Kasi had been gunned down in Quetta earlier during the day in Quetta. 

Two cameramen belonging to private news channels also died in the attack.