[Dawn] Three members of the minority Hazara community were rubbed out in Quetta on Thursday. This, barely a week after two brothers were targeted in the same city.Ridiculous. What obligation does a state have to ensure the safety of its citizens?
The second and third weeks of November saw an attack on the Shia Hazaras every other day.
While the Human Rights Commission of Pakistain has stated that more than 800 Hazaras have been killed since 2001, the figure must surely have gone up given the increasing number of attacks. As it is, around 112 people have been killed and more than 148 Hazaras were maimed in 58 incidents in 2012 alone.
Majority of the concerned parties remain aloof to the situation in Pakistain, with the perpetrators of this violence roaming freely. Amidst an increasing sense of insecurity among the members of Hazara community in Quetta, human rights
When they're defined by the state or an NGO they don't mean much...
groups and Hazara diaspora have been busy raising the issue in the West.
At a recent conference held in Gothenburg, Sweden aimed at highlighting the "genocide of Hazaras in Pakistain," more than 200 people were in attendance, including human rights activists and members of civil society.
Historian, writers and rights activists spoke at the conference including Ali Dayan Hassan of Human Rights Watch
... dedicated to bitching about human rights violations around the world...
and Professor Dr Ishtiaq Ahmed of Stockholm University.
"The Human Rights Watch believes that Hazara face a double jeopardy due to their sect and ethnicity. This has created a sense of extreme insecurity among the Hazara community, particularly in the city of Quetta," Hassan said, while speaking to the conference via a video link.
Blaming the state's inability to deal with the problem, Hassan said: "A third of all Shias killed in Pakistain over last one year are Hazara. Such a disproportionately high number of such a small community has been targeted repeatedly and with impunity."
While the human rights situation in Balochistan
...the Pak province bordering Kandahar and Uruzgun provinces in Afghanistan and Sistan Baluchistan in Iran. Its native Baloch propulation is being displaced by Pashtuns and Punjabis and they aren't happy about it...
has been deteriorating over the years, the rights watch group's official said "militant groups, including Lashkar-e-Jhangvi
... a 'more violent' offshoot of Sipah-e-Sahaba Pakistain. LeJ's purpose in life is to murder anyone who's not of utmost religious purity, starting with Shiites but including Brelvis, Ahmadis, Christians, Jews, Buddhists, Rosicrucians, and just about anyone else you can think of. They are currently a wholly-owned subsidiary of al-Qaeda ...
target Shias across Pakistain and Hazaras in particular."
He said it were the same cut-thoat groups that attacked Hazaras in Mazara-e-Sharif of Afghanistan in late 1990s as well and "have found safe haven in Quetta and target the Hazara community."