Balochistan govt announces Rs2 mn reward for identifying Machh killers

QUETTA: Balochistan government on Friday announced a Rs2 million reward money for identifying the terrorists involved in the massacre of coal miners hailing from the Hazara community in Machh district, ARY NEWS reported.

“Anyone passing on the information regarding the Machh killers will get a reward money of Rs 2 million,” the Balochistan government said while announcing that the name of the informant would be kept secret.

It is pertinent to mention here that 11 coal miners, hailing from the Hazara community, were brutally murdered in Machh district.

The families of the victims have since staged a sit-in in Quetta against the killings, demanding of the government to take concrete action against the culprits besides also asking the prime minister to visit them ahead of the burial of their loved ones.

Prime Minister Imran Khan promised on Friday to visit the families of slain coal miners to express solidarity with them once they bury their loved ones.

“If the bereaved families bury them today, I will go to Quetta today to meet the families of the deceased” the prime minister pledged while speaking at an event in Islamabad.

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He said all of their demands had been met as of Thursday but the Hazara mourners were insisting on his visit to Quetta as a condition for burial of the victims, which, he said, is uncalled for.

“One of their demands is that they will bury the victims once the prime minister comes [to Quetta],” the PM said, adding: “No premier is blackmailed like this in any country.”

Imran Khan said he first sent the interior minister and then two of his cabinet members to the Hazara community to speak and sympathise with them and deliver a message that the government shares their sorrow and pain and fully stands behind them.

The premier said the Machh incident is part of an Indian conspiracy to incite anarchy and sectarian strife in Pakistan. The Indian plot was to murder religious scholars of different schools of thought, he disclosed.

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