An anti-Pakistan demonstration was staged by activists of the Pashtun Takhafuz Movement (PTM) outside the UN headquarters in New York on Friday, June 29, 2018, to protest against the Pakistani security establishment for its direct and indirect involvement in human rights abuses against the suppressed ethnic Pashtuns. The state-sponsored terrorism on both sides of the unauthorized Durand Line has resulted in genocide of Pashtuns by the notorious security agencies of Pakistan, dominated by the northern population of Punjab province.

The protesters lambasted the Pakistan Army for its anti-Pashtun policies which have led to human rights violations, enforced disappearances, displacements, bombardment, and extrajudicial killings of ethnic Pashtuns across Pakistan , a country which has been turned into a hell and slaughter-house for Pashtuns and other suppressed nations within the country.

The PTM activists, comprising Pashtuns from Pakistan and Afghanistan, appealed to the United Nations to impose requisite sanctions against Pakistan to force it to abandon its project of regional and international terrorism. The protesters denounced Pakistan by shaming it with slogans such as - “I’m a student, not a terrorist,” “Who’s behind terrorism - Pakistan,” and “Stop Pashtun Profiling in Pakistan”, and raised black flags. They also displayed banners and placards with anti-Pakistan slogans.

The PTM members in the United States demanded the immediate recovery of missing persons and an end to Pakistani support to terrorist groups that roam freely on its soil. It also demanded an investigation into the military atrocities, human rights abuses against Afghans and religious minorities in Pakistan. The protesters urged the international community to hold Pakistan accountable and take it to the International Court of Justice to defeat Pakistani-state terrorism and establish lasting peace and stability in Afghanistan and the region.

The protesters claimed that the Pakistani Army and its war proxies were responsible for more than 60,000 Pashtuns killed and over 32,000 forcefully disappeared.

Mujeeb Rehman, a Pashtun journalist, has been quoted by ANI News as saying, “The purpose of the protest is to ask the UN to take notice of the human rights abuses across the Pashtun territories. Rehman underscored that the US-based PTM is asking the United Nations for guaranteeing basic human rights such as the right to life with peace and dignity”.

The protesters also demanded UN involvement in the Naqibullah Mahsood case, because they were not satisfied with the hostile attitude of the state institutions of Pakistan for treating Rao Anwar as VIP guest. Rehman claimed that the Pashtuns were being harassed at check-posts, adding that there was a crackdown on PTM activists in Pakistan. “Students are being put in jail and are being tortured. They wanted to protest against this brutality. There are cases against the students,” he added.

Rehman asked the UN to take serious notice on the harassment of Pashtuns at check-posts, abductions and extrajudicial killings.

Since the emergence of the PTM, Pashtuns around the world have been staging peaceful demonstrations to urge the international community to pressure Pakistan and save Pashtuns from state sponsored terrorism on Pashtun soil. However, the international community has yet to device severe punishment for Pakistan to withdraw its projects of regional and international terrorism.

Pashtuns in Pakistan deserve freedom by revisiting the Durand Line and Afghanistan and its people are in dire need of peace and stability; the notorious Afghan Curse must be removed. Pakistan has been conducting state terrorism on both sides of the unauthorized Durand Line to sustain instability and insecurity across Afghanistan and undermine the US-led war on terror through its duplicitous game.

According to experts of Pashtun and regional affairs, replacing Pakistan’s disputed occupation by installation of UN-led administration across the FATA and other Pashtun and Baloch territories in Pakistan could be the ultimate answer to the complex problems of all the stakeholders. The Pashtuns in Pakistan, especially FATA, sandwiched between Pakistan’s military institutions and their war proxies, have recoiled from Pakistan-ism and man-made religious extremism. They want change.

They deserve change and national freedom, instead of turning it into a China-Punjab colony forever. State sponsored terror posed by the China-Punjab nexus could be confronted and defeated through a strong strategic partnership and alliance among the Pashtun, Baloch, Sindhi and the US led international community. The deployment of UN-led administration could help to eradicate terror networks and their launch pads along the Durand Line, as Pakistan has failed in controlling its project of regional and international terrorism. General Zia still lives in Pakistan. We have no option but to bury him forever and disintegrate Punjabistan and peacefully overcome the serious threats to regional and global peace and stability.

The writer is a journalist from Kabul