Blood on the streets

Once again, Quetta’s Shia Hazara community, which has already barricaded itself into ghettos created in the city in a desperate attempt to protect themselves, has been targeted by a suicide bomber. Early Friday morning, 20 persons were killed in a targeted attack at a vegetable market, where many from the nearby Hazaraganji area were purchasing grocery items. At least eight of those killed were Hazara. The Hazaras have been a key target for the anti-Shia Lashkar-e-Jhangvi group, as a, ethnic and sectarian minority. In the past five years, over 500 Hazaras have been killed in Quetta alone, the worst attacks coming in 2013 when over 250 were massacred by bombers. The most recent attack is being linked by some social media and media reports to the release of Ramzan Mengal, a top LeJ Balochistan leader, who it is said was released two days ago after three months in custody. The tragedy for the Hazaras is immense. Between 700,000 and 900,000 Hazaras live in Pakistan, the majority of them in Quetta. According to Hazara leaders, each day young men from the community attempt to escape over the border into Iran and beyond. Many die in this desperate effort to keep themselves alive and safe. Others have died before when boats carrying illegal immigrants capsized and in the repeated gun attacks which have taken place across Balochistan and especially in Quetta.

There is another tragedy here. We have failed to protect a highly vulnerable community despite the National Action Plan chalked out between all major parties in January 2015 and the promises that have been made since then. We have also failed to stop the narrative of hatred spread against citizens on the basis of their belief or the school of thought and sect with which they identify. This, for any country, is a recipe for disaster. Today, the killings continue. There is no evidence that the Lashkar-e-Jhangvi or the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan, the two groups thought to have been behind most previous attacks, have been stopped or even slowed in their spree of killing. According to the tales that have come forward from Quetta over the years, almost every Hazara family in the once harmonious city has suffered death and prolonged suffering. What is even more shameful is the denial that there is an ethnic and sectarian dimension to such killings and that the government and security apparatus have not taken the kind of action needed against sectarian militias.

The reality is that the Hazara community in Quetta is still not safe within the heavily picketed Hazara Town. There has been no action worth the name against the terrorist groups responsible for attacks on the Hazara community. The question for a government which has, as would be expected, condemned the attack, is what it will do beyond the words and tweeted messages. Action has to come, backed by strong will and careful planning. We need to find a way to eradicate hatred and to enable people to live together. Both long- and short-term measures are required. These have been spelled out too often. The time has come to put them into effect on the ground, where the blood of so many men, women and children has already seeped into the soil.