Lawyers observe black day on CJ’s arrival

The Baloch Bar Association registered their protest against the court's inability to recover Baloch missing persons.

The Baloch Bar Association boycotted court proceedings and observed a ‘black day’ on Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry’s arrival in the city on Friday. The lawyers did so to register their protest against the court’s inability to recover Baloch missing persons.

The lawyers did not appear before the high court, lower court and local magistrate as a sign of dissent. They also wore black armbands to mark the day as a black day. According to reports, the strike was observed in Quetta, Mastung, Kalat, Khuzdar, Lasbela, Gwadar, Turbat, Chagai, Kharan, Usta Mohammad, Naushki and other Baloch dominant cities and townships of the province.

Spokesman of the Baloch Bar Association Sadiq Raisani said the aim of the strike was to draw the attention of international organisations towards Balochistan where human rights are being compromised by the state. He claimed that around 8,000 Baloch people are reported to be missing while their applications lay pending before the supreme and high courts for years.

“The judiciary could not trace out a single missing person. Baloch people have no expectations from the judiciary,” he said and alleged that all the missing persons are in the custody of government functionaries.

Justice Chaudhry had arrived in Quetta to chair a meeting of committee making the new judicial policy.

Published in the Express Tribune, June 12^th, 2010.