A blast that took place on Sunday morning in the port city of Gwadar, Balochistan province, left a statue of Pakistan’s founder Mohammad Ali Jinnah completely demolished.
The statue was unveiled in June this year at Marine Drive, otherwise designated as a safe zone. It was blown up by placing an explosive device beneath it, according to a report in Pakistan’s English newspaper Dawn and was carried out by the Baloch Liberation Front.
According to BBC Urdu, Babgar Baloch, a spokesman for the outlawed militant group Baloch Republican Army, claimed responsibility for the bomb on Twitter.
According to Gwadar Deputy Commissioner Major (retd) Abdul Kabir Khan, the case was being probed at the highest level.
“The demolition of Quaid-e-Azam’s statue in #Gwadar is an attack on the ideology of Pakistan. I request authorities to punish the perpetrators in the same way as we did with those behind the attack on Quaid-e-Azam residency in Ziarat,” Balochistan’s former home minister and current Senator Sarfraz Bugti tweeted.
Jinnah, who was born on December 25, 1876, was the leader of the All-India Muslim League from 1913 until the formation of Pakistan on August 14, 1947. He later served as Pakistan’s first governor-general until 1948, when he died.
Since 1947, Balochistan has been Pakistan’s most unstable province on the southwestern border since 1947 and has demanded political rights, autonomy, and territorial control. The Pakistan Army for years has been committing human rights crimes in Balochistan. The area has witnessed unspeakable atrocities, ranging from mass executions to kidnappings, torture, and eventually murder.
