THERE IS A BALOCHISTAN, BUT NO PAKISTAN:

The Baloch State: A vision for the world: With the killing of senior Baloch leader Habib Jalib Baloch in Quetta on Wednesday morning, the Balochistan resistance has once come into focus. In this column, Dr Jumma Khan Marri, a leading Baloch activist, offers his vision for his people (Dr Jumma Khan Marri, 7/14/10, IST)

Sooner or later the world will have to recognise the legitimate right of the Baloch people to independence, for without giving the Baloch their due rights, there is no hope for peace in the areas inhabited by the Baloch in Pakistan, Iran and Afghanistan. The powers that have the clout to persuade these countries to give rights to the Baloch should start using their influence if they want and desire stability and peace in this strategically important region. It should be understood that though the Baloch may not be powerful enough to wrest independence today, the increasing politicisation of the Baloch people is currently underway as much due to the efforts of independence seeking groups as to the constant repression and denial of rights by the concerned countries. If the world wants peaceful passage for the energy resources to reach the markets, they will have to agree to the demands of the Baloch people.

The goal of this article is an attempt to offer the Baloch viewpoint on the ongoing events in Balochistan for the Pakistani and international community to judge. It is also an attempt to offer a possible way out of the tragic deadlock by the Islamabad [ Images ] regime. The irresponsible games the international community has been playing with the Pakistani regime have driven the people of Balochistan and Pakistani establishment into fatal embrace in a way that puts the entire region into instability, which can risk international peace.

This author expresses the hope that this article will be viewed by the apologists with due consideration, no prejudice or hostility, which unfortunately became a logic manifestation of unprecedented anti-Baloch moods (like Balochphobia) in the Pakistani establishment and army.

In spite of the fact that hypocrisy became a business card in international relations a long time ago, we are stating that hypocrisy in politics is counterproductive. Relations between states and nations, as well as between people, are subject to the same law: the law of logic and experience.

It is stupid and amoral for a Baloch to be expressing hypocritically such pro-Western positions in order to gain favour from the international community while in a confrontation with Pakistan. It is just as stupid and useless as the Pakistani side assuring the world community that the Baloch freedom-fighters, who took up arms and who are fighting for freedom, are an aggression through foreign paid agencies. The Baloch national struggle is purely the result of the inhuman condition in which the Baloch are forced to live in. The Baloch people's lands are full of wealth while they can barely feed their kids leave alone the other human needs, but the politics of the world demands they be 'smarter and more artful'. According to this new logic, the Baloch struggle is supposed to be somewhat underground, so that God forbid, Washington or Islamabad do not find out about it.

But in reality it makes no sense and it is counterproductive to try and delude somebody or delude your own self. The point is not to conceal the obvious, but to show the interested countries that the Baloch freedom struggle poses no threat to the world and that it is a natural reaction to foreign aggression and the attempt to physically exterminate the Baloch ethos. And for the Baloch, the international law is a condition of vital importance for national survival and for preservation of their territorial and ethnic identity and independence.

The Baloch freedom struggle is not at war with the Western alliance, even though the Western alliance headed by the US has always been helping Pakistan murder innocent Baloch women and children and to occupy Balochistan and is directly responsible for the crimes against humanity committed by the Islamabad regime.

The Baloch side is defining its goals plainly and clearly and is trying to explain them to the world in an intelligible way that is easy to understand. Proceeding from these tasks, the Baloch side is searching for some common ground with the Western alliance, as well as common ground with the other friendly countries in the region which are totally dependent on the Western alliance.

Once the priorities are highlighted, the Baloch side offers the specific plan of 'political trade operation' ('security in exchange for independence'), where all sides, including the Western alliance, can see their own interests reflected in it. At the same time the Baloch side defends its own interests and its own position, proceeding from the powers and capabilities that it already has, and is stating that it is willing to show responsibility to its partners.

The result can be achieved not by humiliating Islamabad's dignity and betraying the principles, but by a clear and unambiguous indication of the Baloch national goal, which must show the international community and Islamabad the responsibility of the Baloch people and of their leaders just as clearly and unambiguously.

Considered from a selfish Western perspective, carving the region up into -stans will either drain the rage and frustration of the various nationalisms and make the area more peaceful, which is good for everyone, or lead to wars between the statelets, which is very bad for them but good for us, since they'd be turning their hatreds inwards instead of outwards.

Posted by Orrin Judd at July 14, 2010 5:26 PM