QUETTA, BALOCHISTAN: Paank, the human rights wing of the Baloch National Movement (BNM), has said that at least 556 people were forcibly disappeared and 227 others were subjected to extrajudicial or custodial killings across Balochistan between January and June 2026.
In a statement, the organization said a further 171 individuals were released during the same six-month period, describing the figures as amounting to an average of roughly 93 enforced disappearances and 38 killings every month.
According to Paank’s documentation, the monthly data points to a sustained pattern rather than isolated incidents. Enforced disappearances reportedly peaked at 109 cases each in February and April, while killings rose sharply to 52 in May and 59 in June.
The organization said that Pakistan’s Frontier Corps (FC) was implicated in more than half of the documented disappearances, with other cases reportedly involving military intelligence agencies, the Counter-Terrorism Department (CTD) and state-backed armed groups.
Paank said victims were reportedly taken during late-night raids on homes, at checkpoints, from workplaces and educational institutions and from public spaces, with those targeted including students, teachers, laborers, tailors, fuel transporters, women, and children.
The statement also raised concern over reports of custodial executions and staged encounters, in which individuals held in secret detention are later presented as militants killed in armed confrontations — practices Paank said, if established, would constitute serious violations of international human rights law.
Paank further said a broader pattern of collective punishment in the region, citing helicopter bombardments, the destruction and burning of homes, seizure of livestock, blockades and prolonged telecommunications shutdowns during military operations.
Among the incidents cited in the report were the killing of academic Prof. Ghamkhwar Hayat Baloch, the legal proceedings against civil rights leaders including Dr. Mahrang Baloch, and the daytime shooting of a minor, identified as Raahi Assa, in Hoshab.
