Balochistan to get 'internment centres'

As part of efforts to stem the tide of growing unrest in Balochistan, the federal government was expected to give go-ahead to a proposal for the establishment of "internment centres" for terror suspects in the province, people familiar with the development told The Express Tribune on Sunday.

Balochistan was rocked by a series of terrorist attacks on August 26, leaving over 50 people, including security officials martyred. The outlawed Balochistan Liberation Army (BLA) took responsibility of the coordinated attacks in 10 districts.

The province has been facing law and order situation for many decades but this was the deadliest attack in recent years. Following the incident, the federal government along with stakeholders reviewed the security situation and discussed the response.

According to a source, the government decided to give special powers to the law-enforcement authorities, including the army, to make preventive detention of terror suspects for three months without FIR or court orders.

Similar powers were given under the Anti-Terrorism Act (ATA) to the law-enforcement authorities in K-P after the terrorist attack at the Army Public School, Peshawar, in 2014.

Those powers had a sunset clause of two years. The government now decided to introduce similar amendments to the ATA, 1997 to give the special powers to law-enforcement agencies for Balochistan.

One of the proposals includes setting up special internment centres to keep terror suspects without court orders. "The centre may have different name but it would be at the pattern of the internment centres established in K-P," said another source.

Internment centres have primarily been used in the context of counterterrorism operations, especially in the areas affected by militancy and insurgency.

These centres are primarily used to detain individuals suspected of involvement in terrorism, insurgency, or militancy. These suspects are often captured during military operations or security forces' raids.

This strategy was earlier employed in areas affected by militancy like North and South Waziristan, Swat, and other tribal regions.

Apart from detention, some of these centres have been used to implement de-radicalisation and rehabilitation programmes. The idea behind these programs is to rehabilitate militants who have surrendered or been captured with the hope of reintegrating them into society.

One of the controversial aspects of these internment centres is that detainees can often be held without formal charges or trials. The idea, according to a source, is to pre-empt terrorist attacks.