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Long March For Baluch Missing Comes To An End


Ethnic Baluch march to demand justice for enforced disappearances in Pakistan.
Ethnic Baluch march to demand justice for enforced disappearances in Pakistan.
ISLAMABAD -- A nearly 3,000-kilometer march aimed at raising awareness of human rights violations in Pakistan's southwestern province of Balochistan has ended after activists arrived in Islamabad, Pakistan's capital.

A few dozen participants left Quetta, the capital of impoverished Balochistan, three months ago.

The ethnic Baluch activists carried photos of missing relatives, displaying their names and the dates they disappeared.

The marchers demanded that the Pakistani government find their missing relatives, or hold the security forces responsible for their disappearances.

Ethnic Baluch activists accuse Pakistani security agencies of conducting a campaign of kidnapping and murder to stamp out a decades-old Baluch separatist insurgency.

Pakistani officials deny any such campaign of violence targeting Baluch.

Over the years, thousands of people are estimated to have been killed or gone missing in the region.


With reporting by AP and AFP
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