Friday, September 30, 2011



 QUETTA: All major Baloch nationalist parties including Balochistan National Party (BNP-Mengal) and the National Party (NP) on Thursday
boycotted the All Parties Conference (APC) convened by Prime Minister Yusuf Raza Gilani on Pak-US relations.


“How can we attend the APC when Baloch people are facing the wrath of the government,” he said, adding that on the one hand the rulers
had launched the military operation and on the other hand they were inviting “us to sit with those elements involved in the excesses against
Baloch people”. Said Akhtar Mengal, the top Baloch Nationalist leader from exile in Dubai.



The leadership of these both parties believes that the government should have convened the APC on the Balochistan issue where target
killings, sectarian violence and kidnappings for ransom have become a routine matter. They say the rulers are oblivious to the gravity of the
situation in the province.


“If the PPP government does not mend its ways and attitude towards Balochistan then the NP may not even sit on the opposition benches,”
Senator Dr Abdul Malik Baloch, central President of NP, said at a news conference.


The NP decided not to participate in the APC mainly because of the Balochistan situation, he said. He went on to say that the present
government had not taken the issue of Balochistan seriously. He said the party had proposed to the president and prime minister to
convene an APC on target killings, sectarian violence, kidnappings for ransom and recovery of decomposed bodies from various parts of
the province, but to no avail. We took part in the movement for restoration of democracy and ousted Pervez Musharraf, he said.

The All Parties Conference (APC) held in Islamabad will yield no fruitful result because “close and friendly” relations exist between the
establishments in Pakistan and the United States, Dr Malik added.


To a query, he said the way resolutions adopted in the joint session in the past were treated, there was little hope things would happen
differently with this APC. The nationalist politician said that the US and Pakistani establishments were very close to each other, which is why
the APC would yield no results. However, he said if the US attacked Balochistan and Waziristan, NP would surely condemn it. He asked the
government to clear its policy towards the US.


 Related links:
Balochistan boycott the All Party
Conference (APC)