GILGIT: After successful negotiations, authorities in Gilgit managed to secure the release of 31 Sunnis held hostage in Nagar Valley for a week, sources said on Tuesday.
The release came after successful negotiations between the clerics and the government, independent sources confirmed to The Express Tribune.
The hostages included Rasheed - a district health officer from Astore, a civil judge and 29 labourers mostly from outside Gilgit-Baltistan.
No government official was available to provide an official statement on the release.
Armed men had abducted the civil judge and health officer while they were travelling in Nagar Valley along with regional Finance Minister Mohammad Ali Akhtar on April 3, the same day sectarian violence broke out after a protest rally by Sunnis in Gilgit was attacked with hand grenades. The attack on protest left six dead and over 50 injured.
In retaliation, few passenger buses in Sunni-dominated Chilas town were attacked and then put on fire. At least 10 Shia people were killed in these retaliatory attacks.
As a result, Sunni labourers from the Nagar Valley were abducted and shifted to unknown location until their negotiated release today.
“The men have been released and will be brought to Gilgit by night,”said a source.
According to another source, the Shia clerics, Agha Rahat and Sheikh Mirza Ali, played a key role in the release of these men as the Nagar community had authorised them to decide the fate of the abducted men.
Earlier, the government had formed a delegation comprising of regional Law Minister Wazir Shakil and Amjad Hussain for the release of the hostages but it failed to do so.
COMMENTS (16)
Comments are moderated and generally will be posted if they are on-topic and not abusive.
For more information, please see our Comments FAQ
Thanks God that the shias were not blamed for the other 100,000 bombs blasted in Pakistan. Otherwise, it would have been very easy to avenge the deaths of 40,000 Pakistanis. God bless those who suffered and did not reacted in the same manner.
@Pakistani Pakistan is dead and its because of people like you with your "see no evil,l hear no evil attitude" while around you your country burned. This country is just a big plot of land for sale right now.
@Lord: Oh Bahi...... Please stop playing the sectarian card. There are good and bad Sunnis as well as Shias. We will never progress as a nation if we keep talking about sunni Shia punjabi Sindhi pathans and Baluchi. So please think as a Pakistani and identify the black sheep in our community.
The animals on the other side will see this big hearted act as a sign of weakness. They only understand the language of violence, they dont understand love or kindness. Those who show no mercy deserve no mercy. The men should not have been freed so easily, not without getting concessions from the other side.
I am amazed on this newspaper, tribune.com.pk, so much happened against Shia, killings, abductionetc nice January 2012 more than 500 people all over pakistan, and currently dharna (protest) in front of parliament. No a single news of Shia. Now writing release of Sunnis in such a way as if some thing happened to a mazloom who now got justice, please remember these abducted belong to banned organisation with acquisition of murders...... Bravo to tribune. :) Abbas
@Gilgiti-No voting right but Proud Pakistani:
Accident? You mean incident? I wouldn't call wholesale massacres just 'incidents'...and there is no excuse for barbarianism like that. Target killing as despicable as it is, doesn't match mindless heinous wholesale killing. Turn it. If there weren't massacres like Kohistan and Chillas, there wouldn't be target killing. But truth is, there will be massacres still happening even if there weren't target killings. The issue is decades old, not just one year. Way back even before the state backed '88 genocide against the Shiite population by forced and favoured migration of Sunni militants.
You could progress if you had voting rights, recognized provincial status, but a discriminated majority Shiite population are denied fair representation, even in textbooks, ruled by Deoband lawmakers with links to extremist groups who are proxy militants in the region for a shameless federal state, but also carry out their sectarian religious cleansing agenda locally. Can't have peace unless bigoted and violent radical policies are undone, discrimination is recognized and ceased and extremist ideology is eradicated, not exploited for militancy.
A courageous decision made by the people of Nagar to release the 31 hostages; highly appreciable. At a time of great social turbulence and crisis, the decision of the Nagar community to release the hostages, when their own brothers & family members were shot down and stoned to death (in Chilas and Kohistan), is exactly what Islam teaches. I appreciate these sincere efforts of the people of Nagar who always sacrificed for G-B since its independence. This, in fact, is a message of peace to other people; a ray of hope for maintaining harmony in the region. I wish our Sunni brothers understand this message of respect and play their own critical roles in reciprocating the same gestures …Brothers! Enough is enough. We should now understand that ignominy will become our portion if we don’t grasp the rope of Allah (SWT) and if we divide into sectarian battalions (killing each other)....God bless Gilgit-Baltistan.
( sao chohy kha k bili haj ko chali...) its a good news but, if there were no target killing in gilgit during the year then there will be no accident like Kohistan and chillas,,, so hope that the current tragedy will be lesson for both parties to accept each other and leave together in peace like others around the world regardless their religious background.
and we talk about minority rights.... .this country is filled with hatred and evils ... and someway or the other the common man is responsible... stop supporting such causes in name of ethnicity or religion...
Great news that none of the abducted had their lives lost and were all released.
The government must install rule of law, provide protection and fairness to the locals, open the highways, ban extremist organizations' from holding rallies, and apprehend all the militants, be it the Shia grenade attacker or the Sunni highway bus killers.
Shias are prohibited to kill innocent.one more evidence of humanity from oppressed.Thats the difference between them and there killers.