Hazaras
A people of Mongolian descent, the Hazaras mainly reside in Afghanistan, Pakistan and Iran. In Pakistan, their largest concentration is in Quetta - approximately 0.6 million. Easily recognisable by their ethnicity and language, they have become vulnerable to the violence of the Sunni extremist groups, criminals and others who play in the name of religion or ethnicity whichever is suitable. The hapless community has been at the receiving end of targeted violent attacks since the 1990s – product of General Ziaul Haq’s so-called Islamisation project, which fuelled the Shia-Sunni divide in Pakistan.
But in recent years, this violence has assumed particularly disturbing proportions with series of bombings, suicide attacks and targeted assassinations against the community launched by the Sunni sectarian groups such as Lashkar-e-Jhangvi (LeJ) and other sectarian outfits that emerged out of the banned Sipah-e-Sahaba Pakistan. In recent months, new groups have joined in carrying out the violence including Jamaat-ul-Ahrar, a breakaway faction of the Tehreek-e-Taliban, Pakistan (TTP) and the Islamic State (IS). All of these groups consider Shias as kafirs to be eliminated. In 2011, extremist organisations in Quetta sent an open letter to the Hazaras stating that “All Shias are worthy of killing and the intention is to make Pakistan their graveyard.” LeJ particularly sees the community as the main obstacle to safeguard the legacy of the Prophet.
The violence against the Hazara community sharpened in the new millennium. The month of Muharram, time of mourning for the Shia Muslims, has generally witnessed an escalated violence against the Hazaras. Since 2002, at least 2,684 Shia Muslims have perished in a series of bombings, suicide attacks and targeted assassinations against the community in Pakistan. The mostly deadly year was 2013, during which at least 11 attacks were reported, resulting in 239 dead and 400 wounded. In one of the largest attacks, more than 90 people were killed when bombers attacked a snooker club frequented by young Hazara men in January 2013. The attack followed particularly inflammatory sermons from Malik Ishaq, then LeJ Amir. According to estimates, for every 10 Shias killed in Pakistan, 5 of them are Hazaras. Casualties include everyone from students and government employees to sportsmen.
As a result of persistent violence against them, Hazaras have been forced to live in their ghettos- two heavily protected enclaves of Marriabad and Hazara Town, on either side of Quetta. Due to violence, Hazara businessmen have shut down their shops. Hazara employees are being advised not to report to offices. Hazara students have abandoned their studies. These are the unlucky ones who cannot escape the violence, living in an environment of constant fear and terror.
Those who have been fortunate, have been able to sell whatever they own and leave Pakistan in search of security and better future for their loves ones, mostly settling in Indonesia, Australia and other Western countries, , which they perceive as safer and welcoming destinations. Close to 70,000 Hazaras have to abandon their homes for generations for such distant lands.
But the brutality of the religious extremist groups against the Hazaras is matched only by the apathy of the Pakistani state.
It is quite obvious that the neither the army nor the government is interested in protecting the community, their loud rhetoric notwithstanding. Every time there is an attack, Pakistani leaders- civilian and military alike- make vague promises of providing facile protection to the community. Yet, Hazara community leaders have regularly expressed dissatisfaction with such arrangements, saying that these are not as regular or comprehensive as claimed by the police. What makes the matters grave is the abject failure of the authorities to properly investigate any of the attacks or prosecute any attackers, even as extremist leaders continue roaming freely on streets of Pakistan including in Quetta, without impunity giving inflammatory anti-Shia speeches.
There are also reports to suggest that Hazaras are being kept away from sensitive administrative posts both in the armed forces and bureaucracy because they are perceived as pro-Iran and anti-Afghan Taliban, which runs contrary to Pakistan’s pro-Saudi Arabia agenda. Pakistani’s security establishment has also speculated that Hazaras are receiving funding from Iran to incite Shia revolution in Pakistan.
This indifference and discrimination borders on the level of complicity in a systematic cleansing of the Hazara community. Ample evidence has shown linkages between these groups and Pakistani intelligence, which continues to extend ‘kid gloves’ treatment to them. After all, these groups were historically created by Pakistan’s security establishment and still continue to enjoy their covert sponsorship.
Shockingly even the Pakistani civil society has not come to the aid of the community. The only solace that the community has got is from the other non-Hazara Shia Muslims of Pakistan, who equally continue to be fearful of their future in Pakistan. As one of the Pakistani commentators commented recently, “It seemed that the whole country was a silent spectator, if not a cheerleader to this ongoing atrocity.”
The persecution of the Hazara community is unlikely to end in the near future until the Pakistani intelligence establishment abandons its support to the Sunni extremist groups. The plight of Hazaras is an aspect of the large sectarian rift unleashed in Pakistan because of the ill-conceived security and foreign policies that have kept the country embroiled in the regional conflict for hegemony between Saudi Arabia and Iran.
It is naïve of the Pakistan government to expect that world is blind and oblivious to the violence against the Hazaras. Even as it raises voice for the distant Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh, it will do well for the country’s leadership to introspect on its domestic policies, which is causing ethnic cleansing worse than the Rohingyas.
