| Human rights abuses in Sindh | |
|---|---|
 Location of Sindh (highlighted in red) | |
| Location | Sindh, Pakistan |
| Date | Recurring |
| Target | Civilians and combatants |
Human rights abuses in Sindh, Pakistan, range from arbitrary arrests and enforced disappearances to torture, extrajudicial killings, and political repression.
According to the 1994 Human Rights in Developing Countries Yearbook, there have been many cases of political persecution in Sindh. Much of the persecution is linked to Sindh's provincial government, and is undertaken by Karachi's Crime Investigation Agency (CIA). [1] Many human rights abuses were committed under the tenure of Chief Minister Jam Sadiq Ali, who took office from August 6, 1990, to March 5, 1992. Under his tenure, Sindhi independence leader GM Syed was placed under house arrest until his death; however Jam Sadiq's death in 1992 did not cause these acts to cease. Following his death, his seat was contested between his son, Jam Ashiq Ali and a Pakistan Peoples Party member, Shahanawaz Junejo. Ali's supporters undertook intimidation of PPP activists and Shahanawaz Junejo, as well as 200 other opposition activists who were detained. [1]
In March 2005, vice-chairman of the Jeay Sindh Muttahida Mahaz (JSMM) Samiullah Kalhoro died in a hospital of Karachi. The JSMM chief Shafi Burfat alleged that Kalhoro died after his kidney failed as a result of torture in police custody. He added that the JSMM was being punished for pursuing the ideology of G. M. Syed. [2] JSMM has published advertisements in Sindhi newspapers criticising law enforcement agencies. [3]
In November 2010, police allegedly picked up Ali Madad Burfat, an activist of the Jeay Sindh Students' Federation, and his friend, both of whom were students of the Sindh University at the time. [4]
On 21 April 2011, unidentified armed men shot dead three leaders of the Jeay Sindh Muttahida Mahaz (JSMM) including senior Vice-chairman Qurban Khohaver, Rooplo Cholyani and Noorullah Tunio at Bakhoro Mori area in Sanghar district. [5] The JSMM alleged that the personnel of law enforcement agencies were involved in Bakhoro Mori incident. [6] Human Rights Commission of Pakistan published a report on Bakhoro Mori incident and urged that "Agencies’ role in JSMM activists’ murder must be probed". [7] In April 2011, JSMM member Ijaz Solangi's dead body was found in Dadu after he held a press conference against security agencies. [8] [ citation needed ] In October 2011, Asian Human Rights Commission issued an appeal on information it had received that the Sindh University authorities allegedly used law enforcement agencies for disappearances of students in Sindh province. [9]
In a 2012 statement issued by Asian Human Rights Commission, it said that: "In Sindh province more than 100 nationalists were abducted and disappeared after 9/11, many were extra judicially killed and their tortured and bullet riddled bodies were dumped on the streets." It further added that: "Alone, from JSMM 13 people are still missing. Its former leader, Mr. Muzzafar Bhutto was two times abducted and kept in military torture cells where he succumbed to his injuries during the second time detention." [10] [11] [5] Mumtaz Bhutto another activist of JSMM and brother of Muzaffar Bhutto, killed on 1 July 2009 in a bomb blast at Thermal Power house colony Jamshoro, JSMM alleged that security agencies were involved in bomb blast. [12] [ citation needed ]
In 2011, Congressman Dan Burton and Brad Sherman, in their letters to Pakistan's President Asif Ali Zardari, urged him to take steps to end the practice of enforced disappearance in Pakistan. [13] [14] When brought to his attention, Noam Chomsky showed concern on enforced disappearances in Sindh and Balochistan. [15] In September 2012, a delegation of United Nations Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances, visited Pakistan for the first time at the invitation of the Pakistani government. [16]
In May 2018, the families of disappeared political activists staged a hunger strike in protest of their family members and in turn were attacked by security forces[ specify ]. The assault was almost immediately condemned by congressman Sherman. [17]
Safdar Sarki, an activist in the Sindhi nationalist movement, was one of the many disappeared during the period of President Pervez Musharraf's rule. The campaign to "find" him and get him released included Amnesty International, who called for his release. [18] During the first eight months of 2017, roughly "110 nationalist activists and human rights defenders" in Sindh disappeared. [19] The Secretary-General of World Sindhi Congress told the United Nations Human Rights Council on 25 September 2020 that "enforced disappearances of Sindhi people by Pakistan agencies continue unabated. In the last 3 months, over 60 abducted." [20]
Safdar Sarki, a Pakistani-American physician and American citizen, is a former chair of the World Sindhi Congress and Secretary General of the Jeay Sindh Qaumi Mahaz, an activist in the Sindhi nationalist movement, and a former detainee of the Pakistani government. As one of the many disappeared during the period of Gen. Pervez Musharraf's rule, the campaign to "find" him and get him released included prominent human rights organizations, including Amnesty International, and the Asian Human Rights Commission calling for his release, while The New York Times and other news organizations reported that his health was in jeopardy because the Pakistani government refused to allow him necessary medical attention.
Mumtaz Ali Khan Bhutto, was a Pakistani politician who served as 8th Governor of Sindh and later the 13th Chief Minister of Sindh. He was also the first cousin of late Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, who was the Prime Minister of Pakistan from 1973 to 1977.
Sindh National Front (S.N.F.) was a political party active in the province of Sindh, Pakistan. It was led by Mumtaz Bhutto, the cousin of Mr. Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, ex-Prime Minister of Pakistan, who was hanged by President Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq. In 2017, the party merged with Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf.
The Sindhudesh Movement is a separatist movement, based in Sindh, Pakistan, seeking to create a homeland for Sindhis by establishing an ethnic state called Sindhudesh, which would be either autonomous within Pakistan or independent from it.
Jeay Sindh Qaumi Mahaz is a nationalist political party in the Sindh province of Pakistan, that advocates for Sindh's independence from Pakistan. The party was founded in 1995 after death of GM Syed.
Bilawal Bhutto Zardari is a Pakistani politician who served as the 37th Minister of Foreign Affairs, in office from 27 April 2022 to 10 August 2023. He became the chairman of Pakistan People's Party in 2007, following his mother's assassination. Bilawal belongs to the Bhutto family, a prominent political family of Pakistan and is the son of former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto and former President Asif Ali Zardari, and the grandson of former President Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto. Bilawal had been a member of the National Assembly of Pakistan from 13 August 2018 till 10 August 2023.
The Zardari family is a Pakistani political family which currently holds the chieftaincy of the Sindhi-Baloch Zardari tribe. It owns thousands of acres of land in the Sakrand Taluka, Shaheed Benazirabad District, Sindh, especially in the Fatohal Zardari and Balu Ja Quba villages. The family heads the Zardari tribe, which is a Sindhi-Baloch.
Faryal Talpur is a Pakistani politician who had been a member of the National Assembly of Pakistan from 2008 to May 2018 and a member of the Provincial Assembly of Sindh from August 2018 till August 2023, as well as the President of the Women Wing of the Pakistan People's Party.
There are or have been a number of separatist movements in Pakistan based on ethnic and regional nationalism, that have agitated for independence, and sometimes fighting the Pakistan state at various times during its history. As in many other countries, tension arises from the perception of minority/less powerful ethnic groups that other ethnicities dominate the politics and economics of the country to the detriment of those with less power and money. The government of Pakistan has attempted to subdue these separatist movements.
Sindhi nationalism is an ideology that claims that the Sindhis, an ethnolinguistic group native to the Pakistani province of Sindh, form a separate nation. After Bangladesh became independent in 1971, G.M. Syed gave a new direction to nationalism and founded the Jeay Sindh Mahaz in 1972 and presented the idea of Sindhudesh; a separate homeland for Sindhis. G.M. Syed is considered as the founder of modern Sindhi nationalism. However, Sindhi nationalists stand divided upon the idea of a separate country or autonomy within Pakistan.
Zulfiqar Shah is a civil rights activist, journalist and writer of Sindhi origin. He was forced by the Pakistan Army to unlawfully leave the country and close down The Institute for Social Movements, Pakistan in May 2012. He resettled in Nepal, where the UNHCR approved him for refugee status. In Kathmandu, he began freelancing with newspapers and websites on the issues of Pakistan, particularly concerning Sindh and the restive province of Balochistan. He was insurrected in his house in Kathmandu and was given heavy metal poison by the Pakistani intelligence agency ISI with local facilitation; however he was rescued by local doctors. He was forced to leave Nepal, thus he left for Pakistan in December 2013. In Pakistan, he again was persecuted and threatened to be killed. He went India for medical treatment on 11 February 2013, where he was not only denied appropriate health treatment at the behest of the Pakistan High Commission in New Delhi, but was also harassed by high commission officials. He, along his wife Fatima Shah, gave a protest sit-in for 285 days near the Parliament of the Republic of India in defiance of the threats against his life committed by the Pakistan High Commission and its facilitation by the Indian authorities.
The Jeay Sindh Muttahida Mahaz is one of several major separatist political parties in Sindh, Pakistan, that advocate for the separation of Sindhudesh from Pakistan. Founded in the year 2000, by the veteran Sindhi nationalists belonging to the Sindhudesh movement who left JSQM. The founder and the current Chairman of party Shafi Muhammad Burfat is living in exile in Germany under political asylum.
Muzafar Bhutto was a Sindhi nationalist politician, who served as the Secretary General of the Jeay Sindh Muttahida Mahaz (JSMM). His body was found at a roadside near Hatri bypass, in Hyderabad, Pakistan after he went missing on 25 February 2011. Following his death, JSMM members resorted to heavy aerial firing in different areas of Sindh. The heavy aerial firing created fear and panic among the people in Sindh and forced many business to close down.
Shafi Muhammad Burfat also known as Shafi Burfat ; born November 25, 1965, is the founder and current chairman of Jeay Sindh Muttahida Mahaz; a separatist and liberal political party in Sindh, Pakistan who believes in the freedom of Sindhudesh from Pakistan.
Sajjad Shar, is the current Secretary General of banned Jeay Sindh Muttahida Mahaz; A political organization working for freedom of Sindhudesh from Pakistan and was first president of JSMM's student wing Jeay Sindh Students' Federation (JSSF) & was former youngest president of Jeay Sindh Qoumi Mahaz's student wing. currently state had nominated him in several cases of treason and he is one of the underground leader of JSMM.he is now in england reason of BAGHi.
Muhammad Ali Kazi also known as Ali Kazi is a Sindhi journalist and news anchor from Pakistan.
The Jeay Sindh Students’ Federation (JSMM) Sindhi: abbreviated as JSSF JSMM, is the student wing of various separatist organizations struggling for the freedom of Sindhudesh following the ideology of G. M. Syed, founded in 1969. JSSF was a nationalist outfit which emerged from Anti-Unitary System Struggle in the late 1960s and later joined G. M. Syed in his ideology of a separate homeland for Sindhis in 1972. Since then, it has been working as the students’ front of the Jeay Sindh or Sindhudesh movement.
Forced disappearance in Pakistan originated during the military dictator General Pervez Musharraf. The practice continued during subsequent governments. The term missing persons is sometimes used as a euphemism. According to Amina Masood Janjua, a human rights activist and chairperson of Defence of Human Rights Pakistan, there are more than 5,000 reported cases of forced disappearance in Pakistan. Human rights activists allege that the law enforcement agencies in Pakistan are responsible for the cases of forced disappearance in Pakistan. However, the law enforcement agencies in Pakistan deny this and insist that many of the missing persons have either joined militant organisations such as the TTP in Afghanistan and other conflict zones or they have fled to be an illegal immigrant in Europe and died en route.
Bakhtawar Bhutto-Zardari is a Pakistani public figure and educationist. She is the chairperson of SZABIST. She is the daughter of former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto and former President Asif Ali Zardari, sister of former Foreign Minister Bilawal Bhutto Zardari, and granddaughter of former Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, making her a member of the politically prominent Bhutto family of Pakistan. She is also a trustee of SZABIST Foundation, and Sindh Peoples Welfare Trust.
Persecution of Muhajirs or Human rights abuses against Muhajirs or Anti-Muhajir sentiment ranges from discrimination, mass killings, forced disappearances and torture, to political repression and suppression of freedom of speech of Muhajirs, mainly those belonging to the right wing party Muttahida Qaumi Movement – Pakistan.
Another member of JSMM, Muzaffar Bhutto, who had been missing since the previous one and a half years, was killed in Jamshoro in May, 2012.
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