Quetta, Sep 3 : Leading Baloch human rights defender Mir Yar Baloch on Wednesday accused the Pakistani authorities of depriving the Baloch children of education by shutting down schools in Balochistan.

Sharing a video of children protesting in the province, Mir said, "This is Dasht Gawaran in Sui, District Dera Bugti. Here, innocent school children have placed stones on a rough, unpaved road to block it, a desperate act of protest. Why? Because the occupying Pakistani army has shut down their school, snatching away their right to learn, their right to dream, their right to a future.

"These children are being deliberately kept away from education so they never rise as educated, empowered Baloch to serve their homeland, Balochistan," he stated.

Mir alleged that from the lands of Sui in Balochistan, Pakistan's army "loots" 334 cubic feet of gas at gunpoint every single day, transporting it 800 kilometres away to Pakistan's Punjab province and Karachi city, where it fuels factories, lights up cities, and sustains lives. In Punjab, he said, children are granted free education, free healthcare, and even free laptops for college and university students.

However, in Balochistan, Mir highlighted that the same children are left in darkness, denied schools, denied books, and even denied the most basic right to knowledge. He called this not neglect, but a "calculated cruelty".

Asserting that Pakistan's oppression in Balochistan has crossed all limits, Mir said, the people of Balochistan are no longer silent.

"They are uniting, rising, and struggling for complete liberation of their homeland, so they can finally break free from Pakistan's chains of slavery. They yearn to breathe in dignity, to build a prosperous future as a free nation, and to take into their own hands the destiny of their beloved land, Balochistan, no longer dictated by the guns and greed of foreign occupiers. Balochistan will not be silenced. Its children will not be broken. Its people will not surrender,' the human rights activist emphasised.

People from Balochistan are currently fighting for their independence from Pakistan. Various human rights organisations of Balochistan have time and again highlighted the repression by Pakistani forces in the province, which includes violent raids on the homes of Baloch leaders and civilians, unlawful arrests, enforced disappearances, the 'kill and dump' policy, detention under the Maintenance of Public Order Ordinance, and the filing of fabricated police cases.

/IANS