ISLAMABAD: India is using the Baloch resistance to settle its score for Kashmir with Pakistan and funnelling money to the Baloch fighter groups for militancy.
Ghazan Marri, the Baloch leader who has been in self-exile since last 18 years, expressed these views while talking to Daily Times from his UAE apartment. “How else are they surviving and leading such lavish lives?” he hinted towards Brahumdagh Bugti, the rebel son of slain Baloch leader Akbar Bugti, who has publicly resorted to Indian Prime Minister Modi for help in ‘Baloch cause’.
Ghazan Marri is the son of revered Baloch nationalist leader, late Kher Bakhsh Marri, and is accused of being the co-founder of now proscribed Baloch Liberation Army (BLA).
“It was my brother’s organisation, not mine, and I distanced myself from BLA following my father’s teachings of non-violent and peaceful resistance,” Marri claims. He said Pakistan’s establishment wrongly framed him in various criminal cases that included murder of Balochistan High Court judge Nawaz Marri, false cases of terrorism and destruction of installations. He denied being part of any terrorist activity or militancy that he has ever been accused of.
Ghazan Mari had escaped in 1999 following the crackdown on Baloch nationalists wherein his father Kher Bakhsh Marri was arrested in old age. My father then persuaded me to escape because the establishment was bent upon punishing all of us and that’s when I escaped to Dubai, he said. In 2006, then Minister of Interior Aftab Sherpao had claimed that Dubai authorities had repatriated Marri and handed him over to Pakistan’s intelligence agencies where he was being tried under Anti Terrorist Court.
Ghazan Marri while talking to Daily Times strongly denied this. He said he was never handed over to any Pakistani authority, nor he ever was repatriated to Pakistan. In fact, he said, Pakistan’s establishment under Gen Pervez Musharraf had issued red warrants against him in 2005, following, which he as arrested by the Interpol on the “false charges of money laundering worth $10 million”. However, Interpol soon found out that all the cases against him were politically motivated and that’s why after remaining six months and ten days in Interpol custody, he was acquitted of all charges after a thorough trial. “Musharraf government framed me for 190 murders and the Nishtar Park terrorist attack, which had happened while I was under Interpol custody in Dubai. “That was enough, among many other evidences, for the Interpol to conclude that this was a politically motivated witch-hunt”, Marri said.
Responding to the question about the allegation of having received funding from three foreign countries, the charge framed by the Musharraf government back in 2006, Ghazan Mari said he was prepared to present his bank accounts for every kind of scrutiny. When asked how, then, he was able to fund his lifestyle in Dubai for last 18 years he said his family owned hundreds of acres of arable land back home in Pakistan, which was enough to feed him and his family.
Talking about the Baloch separatism he said he was not sure if he would be joining that bandwagon, but if the majority of his tribe, elders and supporters would want that he would choose that path. However, he said, all these groups ostensibly posing ‘resistance’ in the name of Baloch cause had turned into mercenaries who would kill for money and influence. “No wonder Baloch separatists and some religiously motivated sectarian organisations are working in tandem in Balochistan”, he added.
Talking about the terrorist attacks on Punjabi labourers, Marri said this was not what the Baloch are about. “If we are against oppression, how could we use oppression to achieve our objectives?” On missing persons, Marri sounded very agitated and reminded the military establishment of Pakistan’s constitution and law. “If you want Baloch nationalists to concede to Pakistan’s constitution, you have to make sure that you follow your own constitution and law yourself”. He said Pakistan’s military establishment is creating such a situation in some areas of Balochistan that FC becomes a permanent requirement for maintaining law and order. “If peace has to be brought to Balochistan, Army will have to go back to barracks”, he said.
“If some parties are trying to change Balochistan’s demography against the Baloch, it can’t happen without the establishment’s support”, Marri said about the influx of Afghan refugees in Balochistan and their naturalisation through legal or illegal means. If “they” are doing it deliberately, they should understand that it would harm their own interests at the end of the day because the radicalisation that this population is bringing would become impossible to handle, he said.
Marri says he had nothing against Pakistan’s military “only if they stop interfering with people’s choices in Balochistan and handpicking their lackeys like Changez Marri (his brother) for representation of people”. He said PML-N government had been putting all kinds of obstacles for him since 2014 when he decided to come back after his father passed away.
He said military establishment used to approach him during Musharraf’s time to cut a deal and come back, “which was always denied because my elders thought it might not be a best decision”. After 2008 elections however, then President Asif Ali Zardari contacted and “offered me Governorship of Balochistan”. When asked why he didn’t accept the offer, he smiled “Zardari sahib, although poles apart politically, but has been a social acquaintance since 1975. I respected Shaheed Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto like my elder sister and considered her as my mentor. But unfortunately, Mr. Zardari is an impulsive person having little foresight”. He said that in that particular meeting, then Interior Minister Rehman Malik was accompanying Mr. Zardari and told me to immediately decide taking the offer. “It was this now-or-never attitude that was not acceptable to me as I had to discuss this with my tribal elders. So that deal could never be sealed”.
Ghazan is scheduled to come back to Pakistan immediately after Eid, after which he would decide about his political future. He denied that he was coming back after some understanding with the military establishment. “I know I can be arrested as soon as I arrive Pakistan. All I demand from military establishment is a fair trial”, Marri said.
