Hundreds of protesters from the town of Mashkel have embarked on a grueling long march towards the provincial capital Quetta, against the Pak Army’s systemic economic strangulation and oppression of the Baloch people.
The Mashkel protesters, comprising men, women and children began their march on foot after a 30-day sit-in protest in their town failed to draw any response from authorities regarding the crippling closure of the vital Maza Sar border crossing point with Afghanistan.
Upon reaching Quetta after the nearly 200 k.m. trek, the marchers have vowed to stage an indefinite sit-in outside the Pak-occupied-Balochistan Provincial Assembly, demanding immediate action to ease the humanitarian crisis unfolding in the border town.
The Army has unleashed systemic genocide on Baloch people through enforced disappearances, extrajudicial killings, false imprisonments and economic suffocation. Mashkel’s very survival is at stake due to the border closure.
The remote town of Mashkel lies in a region straddling the Afghanistan-Pakistan border, with its economic lifeline dependent on cross-border trade and movement. However, the closure of the Maza Sar crossing point since the COVID-19 pandemic has paralyzed this vital trade artery, leading to acute shortages of food, medicines and other essentials.
Children are going hungry, our sick cannot access medical care due to this illegal border blockade by Pak Army. They have been rendered prisoners on their own land.
The marchers have demanded the immediate reopening of not just the Maza Sar crossing, but also other key border points like Sir and Zero Point, stating that their very livelihoods have been destroyed by Islamabad’s collective punishment policies against occupied-Balochistan.
The powerful visuals of the Mashkel Caravan, comprising people of all ages braving the scorching desert terrain, have sparked an outpouring of support and solidarity protests.
However, Pak authorities have responded with a brutal crackdown, imposing internet shutdowns, mass arrests of activists and enforced disappearances to quell the dissenting voices.
The Army wants to economically bleed the Baloch land, starve the population into submission for daring to demand the basic rights over their own resources and lands. But this march is a resounding rejection of that oppression.