No leads in activist’s murder as free-speech fears grow
INVESTIGATORS HAVE DRAWN A BLANK DESPITE RECOVERING BULLET CASINGS AT THE SCENE
Pakistani investigators have found no match for casings of bullets that killed a prominent human rights activist, dashing hopes for quick answers to a murder that has raised fears for the safety of dissenting voices.
Gunmen on a motorcycle attacked activist Sabeen Mahmoud late last Friday in Pakistan’s southern city of Karachi, as she was leaving her cafe, where she held art exhibitions and talks.
‘New group or weapon’
She had just hosted a discussion on disappearances in Balochistan, a resource-rich southwestern province where the Pakistani army is fighting a separatist insurgency, and, rights workers say, overseeing a campaign of killing opponents. The army denies rights abuses.
Investigators recovered bullet casings from the scene but drew a blank.
“That suggests that a new group or new weapon has been used in the killing,” a law enforcement official involved in the case, who declined to be identified because the topic is sensitive, said late on Monday.
Police say their only witness is Mahmoud’s mother, who was with her and was wounded. Investigators suspect the killers had a backup team of two men on a motorcycle and police are poring over CCTV footage.
Investigators desperate for clues are monitoring social media in hopes that loose talk could provide a lead, said another senior law enforcement official.
Authorities had earlier blocked the talk, titled “Unsilencing Balochistan”, when it was scheduled at a different venue. Mahmoud had told friends that officials of the military’s Inter-Services Intelligence agency visited her in 2013 to ask about her work and finances, the law enforcement official said.
She had recently asked friends if she should go ahead with the Balochistan talk, he added.
The army condemned Mahmoud’s killing, saying its intelligence agents would help in the investigation.
Fear among the people
Human rights workers have not been reassured.
“There’s a lot of fear among the people, about whoever speaks out about Balochistan, what’s going to happen,” said Rukhsana Shama of the rights group Bedari.
“It’s easy to point fingers at the agencies but no one knows.”
For many Pakistanis, the separatists in Balochistan pose a more alarming threat than Islamist militants.
Pakistan says the rebels get help from neighbour and archrival India, but India denies this.
Security concerns in the province took on added urgency days before Mahmoud was killed, when China’s President Xi Jinping unveiled projects worth up to $46 billion for an economic corridor anchored there.