QUETTA, BALOCHISTAN: Nasrullah Baloch, chairman of Voice for Baloch Missing Persons (VBMP), has said the government and the courts have failed the families of two University of Balochistan students who were forcibly disappeared on November 1, 2021 and who have still not been recovered five years later.
In a statement, Nasrullah Baloch named the students as Sohail Ahmed, son of Lal Muhammad and Muhammad Fasihullah Shah, son of Abdul Rauf Shah. He said both were regular BS students in the university’s Pakistan Studies department and lived in the university’s boys’ hostel. He called their continued disappearance after five years extremely worrying.
He said the disappearance of the two young men has left their families in severe mental anguish and pain. Despite the long passage of time, he said, the families are still waiting for their loved ones to return, but no satisfactory information about them has been given to them.
Baloch said the families have approached the relevant government institutions, the judiciary and the Commission of Inquiry on Enforced Disappearances many times to seek the students’ recovery and information about them. Despite a long legal struggle and repeated petitions, he said, they have still not received justice. He said this situation raises serious questions not only for the affected families but also for the rule of law and basic human rights.
VBMP chairman Nasrullah Baloch said the VBMP and the families demand that Sohail Ahmed and Muhammad Fasihullah Shah be recovered immediately. If there is any allegation against them, he said, they should be produced before a court under the constitution and law and given the right to a fair legal process. He also demanded that those responsible for the disappearance be identified and held accountable and that the families be given authentic information about their sons without delay.
He appealed to the government, the judiciary and the Commission of Inquiry on Enforced Disappearances to take serious notice of the case, take effective steps to recover the two students, and free the families from further waiting and suffering by giving them justice.
The two students were reported disappeared from the university campus in Quetta in early November 2021. The case led to weeks of student protests, with academic activities halted and the university later closed until the students were recovered. Reports at the time said the students were from Noshki district. Authorities have generally denied involvement in enforced disappearances. The students had still disappeared at the time of the last report.
