Kidnapped in Balochistan: Swiss couple still alive, says Loralai commissioner

According to the official the two foreign nationals are likely still in the district.

LORALAI:

The two Swiss nationals who went missing in the Loralai district of Balochistan about three weeks ago are still alive, Muhammad Ikhtiyar, the commissioner of the district, told The Express Tribune.

“All circumstantial evidence shows that they are very much alive,” said Ikhtiyar, who is the highest ranking administrative official in the district. “We would have received some information had they been killed. May Allah keep them alive and Allah willing they are alive.”

Swiss national David Olivier, 31, and Widmar Daniela, 29, were abducted by unidentified gunmen in Loralai on July 1, according to media reports. Balochistan Home Secretary Zafarullah Khan said that he believed that the couple had been taken to the tribal areas bordering Afghanistan. Balochistan police officials concur with that assessment.

However, on July 17, an official source told The Express Tribune on the condition of anonymity that the couple had been detained by security agencies for ‘dubious activities.’ “They were suspected to be undercover agents,” he said.

The Loralai commissioner, meanwhile, dismissed some media reports that suggested that the Swiss couple may have been abducted by the Taliban. “Had that been the case, there would have been some claim of responsibility,” he said.

The Balochistan Home Secretary concurred with that assessment. “Yes they have been abducted, but nobody knows who those people are,” he said.

Provincial government officials, meanwhile, appear to be reviewing the lapses in providing security to the couple on the part of the police.

“Chief Minister Nawab Aslam Raisani has taken a very serious view of the security lapses,” said Ikhtiyar. Raisani has asked the Loralai deputy commissioner to present him with a detailed report on the circumstances that led to the couple’s abduction.

There also appears to be a discrepancy between the accounts of the event presented by the district commissioner and the provincial home secretary. The home secretary claimed that five Pashto-speaking men abducted the couple, while the commissioner said that there were only three kidnappers.

Yet this is not the only discrepancy.

The home minister also put the blame for the incident at least partially on the Swiss couple themselves, saying that they should not have been travelling in an unsafe region of Balochistan without informing the federal government. The commissioner chooses instead to blame the police’s negligence.

While home secretary believes the couple has been taken to the tribal areas, the commissioner believes that they are likely to be still in Loralai.

The Swiss embassy has sent one of its Pakistani employees, a former army officer, to collect information about the matter. Swiss diplomats have also been in touch with the Loralai commissioner, calling him twice. Yet Ikhtiyar did not characterise the contact as constituting any pressure on him.

“I don’t think that there is any pressure from the Swiss embassy,” he said. “We would have been told by the federal interior ministry, had there been any pressure from the Swiss embassy.”

Ikhtiyar also ruled out American involvement. “The situation would not have been so calm had the Americans been active in searching for the Swiss couple.”

Published in The Express Tribune, July 25^th,  2011.