Balochistan: Sammi Deen Baloch has alleged that she and her family are under constant harassment and threats from Pakistani security forces.
In a detailed statement, she said that five days ago, upon arriving in her hometown Mashkay with her family, the Pakistani military immediately surrounded the village. For the past five days, the entire village has been under siege. She claimed that she has been kept under round-the-clock surveillance using binoculars, drones, and other monitoring devices. Flashlights were shone on the sleeping area outside their rooms throughout the night. Her movement was restricted, and her relatives were intimidated and harassed in various ways, with officials calling her name directly in their threats.
She further stated that all homes in the village were searched. Photos of the men were taken, and women’s national identity cards were confiscated. Civilians were made to stand for hours in the intense heat. Two of her cousins, both students, were allegedly detained and taken to an army camp. One was reportedly released after being subjected to 24 hours of physical torture, while the other remains missing.
Sammi Deen added that her relatives were forcibly taken to the army camp and made to record video statements falsely declaring her, Sammi Deen, a terrorist. She stressed that the use of profiling, harassment, threats, and forced confessional videos aimed at character assassination shows the fear and weakness of the institutions that are resorting to false propaganda to cover up their failures.
“This is not the first time my close relatives have been targeted just because of their association with me,” she said. “In the past as well, family members have been forcibly disappeared for months, even years, and subjected to inhumane treatment and torture, simply because they are related to me.”
She emphasized that the goal behind the profiling, forced interrogations, harassment, and disappearances of her relatives is not just to pressure her physically but also to socially isolate her, to collectively punish her family, and to force her to abandon her principles, her voice, and her peaceful struggle.
She concluded by saying that the Pakistani state and military’s use of false cases, violence, threats, collective punishment, and harassment to silence her and her peers only reveals their desperation and weakness in the face of a peaceful resistance movement. “These tactics have failed. We will not be silenced, nor will we stop raising our voice against the state’s ongoing brutality and oppression in Balochistan.”
“Our struggle,” she vowed, “will continue until the last trace of injustice and oppression is erased.”
