08-28-2006, 09:53 AM
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->Incensed Baluchis rise in revolt
Abdul Sattar/AP | Quetta
Quetta, Karachi erupt in flames
The killing of a top tribal chief by Pakistani troops sparked widespread violence and rioting on Sunday and raised fears that a decades-old conflict in the country's volatile southwest could widen.
Nawab Akbar Bugti's death in a Pakistani raid on his mountain hide-out Saturday was "the darkest chapter in Pakistan's history," former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif told Pakistani TV. Â
For the second consecutive day on Sunday, angry mobs torched shops, buses, banks and police vehicles in Quetta, capital of Baluchistan, to protest Bugti's killing.
Police arrested 450 people for defying a curfew imposed to maintain order. Violence spread across Baluchistan and into neighbouring Sindh province, where ethnic Baluchis burned tyres in Karachi.
Political leaders and analysts feared the killing of 79-year-old Bugti, an articulate, English-speaking champion of greater rights for ethnic-Baluch tribespeople, could influence more young Pakistanis to take up militancy.
Talaat Masood, a Pakistani analyst and former army general, described Bugti's death as a "great tragedy" that will further divide ordinary Pakistanis from the military, led by President Gen Pervez Musharraf.
"It is very dangerous when we are already fighting (al-Qaeda) terrorists in Pakistan to bring about another reason for radicalising the youth," Masood said.
On the streets of Quetta, anti-government sentiment was at fever-pitch. "The Government has killed the Baluch leader. We will take revenge," said 27-year-old Quetta college student Ghulam Mohiuddin. An alliance of four Baluch nationalist groups announced 15 days of mourning for Bugti's death and vowed to continue protests throughout the region.
Baluchistan, which borders Afghanistan and Iran, has been wracked by decades of low-level conflict that has often flared into large-scale clashes, as ethnic-Baluch tribes people led by Bugti pressed the Government for an increased share of wealth from natural resources extracted from the province, including gas, oil and coal.
Bugti's son-in-law, Shahid Bugti, a senator in Pakistan's parliament, denounced the killing and demanded the government return the tribal chief's body so his family for burial. Khan said the military had not yet retrieved his body.
<b>"This is a very tragic affair for the whole family, the tribe and the people of the whole region," Shahid Bugti said from his father-in-law's family house in Quetta. "We consider him a martyr. He led a very graceful life and he had a graceful death, going out while fighting for his people's rights." </b>
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Abdul Sattar/AP | Quetta
Quetta, Karachi erupt in flames
The killing of a top tribal chief by Pakistani troops sparked widespread violence and rioting on Sunday and raised fears that a decades-old conflict in the country's volatile southwest could widen.
Nawab Akbar Bugti's death in a Pakistani raid on his mountain hide-out Saturday was "the darkest chapter in Pakistan's history," former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif told Pakistani TV. Â
For the second consecutive day on Sunday, angry mobs torched shops, buses, banks and police vehicles in Quetta, capital of Baluchistan, to protest Bugti's killing.
Police arrested 450 people for defying a curfew imposed to maintain order. Violence spread across Baluchistan and into neighbouring Sindh province, where ethnic Baluchis burned tyres in Karachi.
Political leaders and analysts feared the killing of 79-year-old Bugti, an articulate, English-speaking champion of greater rights for ethnic-Baluch tribespeople, could influence more young Pakistanis to take up militancy.
Talaat Masood, a Pakistani analyst and former army general, described Bugti's death as a "great tragedy" that will further divide ordinary Pakistanis from the military, led by President Gen Pervez Musharraf.
"It is very dangerous when we are already fighting (al-Qaeda) terrorists in Pakistan to bring about another reason for radicalising the youth," Masood said.
On the streets of Quetta, anti-government sentiment was at fever-pitch. "The Government has killed the Baluch leader. We will take revenge," said 27-year-old Quetta college student Ghulam Mohiuddin. An alliance of four Baluch nationalist groups announced 15 days of mourning for Bugti's death and vowed to continue protests throughout the region.
Baluchistan, which borders Afghanistan and Iran, has been wracked by decades of low-level conflict that has often flared into large-scale clashes, as ethnic-Baluch tribes people led by Bugti pressed the Government for an increased share of wealth from natural resources extracted from the province, including gas, oil and coal.
Bugti's son-in-law, Shahid Bugti, a senator in Pakistan's parliament, denounced the killing and demanded the government return the tribal chief's body so his family for burial. Khan said the military had not yet retrieved his body.
<b>"This is a very tragic affair for the whole family, the tribe and the people of the whole region," Shahid Bugti said from his father-in-law's family house in Quetta. "We consider him a martyr. He led a very graceful life and he had a graceful death, going out while fighting for his people's rights." </b>
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