World Outrage Over Pak Nukes

Scores of people from all over the world have signed an international petition to halt Pakistan's nuclear weapons program in the areawise largest Baluchistan province and to give the people there the right to self-determination.

Baluchistan, resource rich and located on the strategic Straits of Hormuz, is the energy backbone of Pakistan, but its inhabitants are one of the poorest in the world. Pakistan conducted deadly nuclear tests in Baluchistan on May 27, 1998 amid Baluch protests.

"Whereas all nuclear weapons are equally condemnable, but Pakistan's weapons of mass destruction is even more dangerous as it is religion-specific," the petition states.

[See petition: http://www.thepetitionsite.com/2/stop-nuclear-tests-in-baluchistan].

Immediately after the tests, Islamic radicals took to the streets of Pakistan  in jubilation, chanting Allahu Akbar slogans. They had missile replicas mounted on trucks, with "Death to the U.S., India and Israel" written on them.

Citizens from Afghanistan, Argentina, Australia, Bahrain, Bangladesh, Barbados, Belgium, Brazil, Bulgaria, Canada, Colombia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Israel, India, Iran, Netherlands, Oman, Palau, Portugal, Puerto Rico, Romania, Russia, South Africa, Sweden, Turkey, United Arab Emirates, U.S., U.K., and even Pakistan itself are among those who have signed the petition.

From Greece, Roula Tsokalidou, while signing the petition said, "Although we are geographically far from Baluchistan, we know people from this region, young and old, people who have walked for many kilometers to go to school and managed to get an education, other people who couldn't get an education and for all of those people's lives we have great respect...please. No nuclear tests in Baluchistan."

Sheila Gibbs, from Canada, addressing Pakistan, said, "Can you not stop your unacceptable, unnecessary, indignant behavior! Or, hey, are you the main source of 99 percent of this world's problems? Please cease this ridiculousness, before you alienate all of society.... Well, I guess you will be permanently stopped, won't you ?"

A second Canadian, Janet Solomon, exclaimed, "Oh, this is just lunacy."

Lee Drury, originally from New Zealand, who now lives in the Washington DC area, said, "Nuclear bombs are not only harmful to the immediate area they cause harm to the entire planet!"

Americans, who had not heard about Baluchistan before, expressed their disgust.

"Hardly anyone even knows about this issue. We need to stop looking the other way regarding the actions of Pakistan," said Judy Coleman of Nebraska.

Another American said, "I never knew about Baluchistan." Colin Rogers from Louisiana adds, "I'm not surprised that Punjabi Pakistan is trying to destroy the Baluch. This reminds me of their war on the Bengalis many years ago."

Rogers was refering to the war of liberation in Bangladesh in 1971. That year Pakistan Army conducted a genocide of Bengalis in the erstwjhile East Pakistan, now Bangladesh. As many as three million Bengalis were killed.

From Bangladesh, Tarequl Islam Munna, repeating what is being demanded in the petition said, "Stop all military supplies to Pakistan until such time it winds up its nuclear weapons program in Baluchistan and grants the Baluch people their right to self-determination."

In spite of an ignonmous defeat, recent press reports say Pakistan is repeating the same mistake in Baluchistan. Two years ago, Pakistan army extra judicially killed former governor and chief minister of Baluchistan, Nawab Akbar Bugti, 79.

Even Bugti's last remains were not returned to the bereaved family.

Former U.S. amabassador to Pakistan, Robert Oakley, showered praise on Bugti during the slain leader's lifetime and said he was capable enough to become the glovernor of any state in the U.S. Oakley called Bugti a martyr.

Tens of thousands of Bugti tribesmen have been rendered destitute since Bugti's slaying and a recent report of the Associated Press said many minors may die in the cold winter for lack of food, water and warmth.

A well-informed Baluch source in the United Arab Emirates said the Press has been barred from covering the plight of the displaced Bugti tribesmen.

"I have been informed that Aljazeera reporter tried to visit Dera Bugti but he has been intimidated, manhandled and forced to return back to Islamabad," said Saeed Al-Ameeri, a Baluch veteran who now lives in the Gulf port city of Ajman and is naturalized in the U.A.E. "Trucks of humanitarian aid has been bombarded by Pakistani Air Force. Pakistani media shamelessly kept silence over the atrocities of the army in Dera Bugti."

The Sui area in Baluchistan is the home turf of the Bugti tribe and produces natural gas worth $7 million each day. The Baluch bitterly complain Islamabad has given them only 10 days worth of that money, pocketing the rest, for more than half century now.

Natural gas from Sui is transported hundreds of miles away to the major cities in Punjab and Karachi, home to the two dominant ethnic groups Punjabi and Mohajir -- Muslims from India who migrated to Pakistan after the 1947 partition in search of better jobs --, but many areas in Baluchistan have not received the gas as yet.

Even in the immediate vicinity of Sui, the Baluch populace use cow dung to cook food -- one of the main complaints of slain Bugti.

Pakistan's present army chief General Ashfaq Kyani is a Punjabi, while his spokesperson Major General Athar Abbas is a Mohajir. Abbas's three brothers Zafar, Mazhar and Azhar, who share the same last name Abbas, are top journalists in Pakistan.

The Baluch point out since the Punjabis and Mohajirs control both the army and the media in Pakistan, Press reports of military atrocities on them are few and far between. Pakistan fetters foreign media from reporting on Baluchistan and few years ago Carlotta Gall of The New York Times was beaten up when she went to Quetta to write stories.

While signing the petition, one American demanded cutting off aid to Pakistan.

"Please do not supply any more money of any kind .... stop them from making any more weapons of destruction," Joy Bergstrom wrote from North Carolina.

Robbie Morganfield, a former executive director of the Freedom Forum Diversity Institute who is now a pastor at a black church in the DC area, said, "Bombs are never the solution. Please work for peace."

Many independent intellectuals call the Baluch children of a lesser God in Pakistan.

Professor Gul Agha from Urbana, Ill., in a public posting on the 'Balochunity' yahoo groups discussions list -- the largest of its kind pertaining to Baluchistan politics --, said Thursday when Pakistan bombed Baluch villages and destroyed crops, displacing a million Baluch. 'They then blockaded relief supplies, which caused tens of thousands of Baluch children to perish from hunger and disease."

He said it was difficult to ascertain the exact fatalities as there was no census.

"The world took ten months to force Pakistan to allow basic food to go through [in Baluchistan]. The world press paid scant attention and there were no U.N. resolutions, just quiet "diplomacy." {There were] No regular daily or weekly or monthly news bulletins on CBS, BBC, Al-Jazeera, Star News or anywhere. Just a [small] story here and there."

People in India, worst affected by Pakistan-based terrorism, voiced extreme concern over the nuclear testing in Baluchistan. In November Army of Pure militants linked to spy service Inter Services Intelligence carried out attacks on India's commercial capital Mumbai that left 200 dead and more than 300 wounded.

"Pakistan is and will never probably will be stable unless the existing majority of radicals are flushed out of the system. Why should some else suffer?," Prasad Rao wrote from India, in sympathy for the Baluch.

Aziz Baloch, a leading member of the Baluch Human Rights Council in Vancouver, Canada, said "Baluch people have for the last sixty years been demanding basic needs. In stead, [of giving those] the rulers of Pakistan are using Baluchistan for deadly nuclear tests."

He recalled the Baluchistan state parliament, called provincial assembly, unanimously passed many resolutions against nuclear testing but Islamabad paid no heed. "Therefore, the Baluch are appealing to the international community and United Nations that further nuclear tests must be stopped in Baluchistan to save both the nomadic Baluch and their land."

Pakistanis themselves have signed the petition and posted comments. Sabir Nazar from Pakistan wrote, "I endorse, 'no Islamic explosions of bombs in Baluchistan.' Pakistanis should care more about stopping suicide bombings in Pakistan."

Moscow-based Dr. Jumma Marri, whose father Mir Hazar Khan Bijarani was a the hero of the 1973-77 Baluch uprising against Pakistani military, said, "By signing this petition you prove yourself to be a kind and loving person. Save the world from a nuclear holocaust."

In all there have been five military operations, which the Baluch call wars of liberation, against Baluchistan's forced merger in 1948--seven and half months after the British left India divided on August 14, 1947.

Thousands perished in the five wars.

The petition, aimed at forcing Pakistan to scrap its nuclear weapons program like Libya did recently, has been launched by the DC-based American Friends of Baluchistan.

Rasheed Baloch, presiding council member of the A.F.B., urged all those citizens of the world who believe in peace, justice and democracy to step up to the plate and save humankind from imminent doom.

"The civilized world should be apprehensive about the fact that it would be a great debacle of modern history if this so-called Islamic bomb falls in the hands of fanatic jihadists. We Baluch, as a secular and peaceful people, urge the free world to deter Pakistani Army generals from further testing of nuclear bombs on Baluch soil," he said from Dallas, Texas.

A man from Africa echoed Baloch's sentiments. Jill Vickerman from South Africa, said, "It is extremely worrying that Pakistan considers other religions its enemies and has made clear it will not desist from being the first to use nuclear weapons."

Baluch nationalists insist the nuclear tests on their homeland were an abominable offence against nature since they have documents to prove their Texas-sized territory was annexed illegally by Pakistan in March 1948.

After getting one hundred thousand signatures, the A.F.B. plans to submit it to key international bodies and to take Pakistani army generals to task for war crimes.

American signatories to the international petition include residents of Arizona, California, Colorado, District of Columbia, Florida, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maryland, Massachusetts, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nevada, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Oregon, Kansas, Maine, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Texas, Washington, West Virginia, and Wisconsin.

Peter Tatchell, London-based human rights acitivist, is among those who have signed the petition.

[Please take a moment to sign the petition:

 http://www.thepetitionsite.com/2/stop-nuclear-tests-in-baluchistan].