Sattar visits sit-in, demands release of missing Shia persons

Senior politician and head of a faction of the Muttahida Qaumi Movement-Pakistan Dr Farooq Sattar on Sunday termed enforced disappearances of youth a serious violation of human rights and asked the government and state institutions to resolve the issue.

He expressed these views while visiting the protest sit-in camp of the Shia community who have been protesting in front of the Mazar-e-Quaid since April 2 for the recovery of their missing loved ones. The Joint Action Committee for Shia Missing Persons have organised the sit-in camp.

Sattar said that only claims of the supremacy of constitution and law were being made in the country. “In a democratic country, families of missing persons are holding constitutional and legal sit-ins, demanding the government to show the whereabouts of their relatives,” he lamented.

He was also accompanied by other leaders of his party, including former MPA Qamar Abbas and Jamal Ahmed. Sattar demanded of the government to release the missing persons during the holy month of Ramadan.

Allama Ahmad Iqbal Rizvi, a leader of the action committee, said that the sit-in would continue until the recovery of all the missing persons of the Shia community. “It is our constitutional and legal demand, and we will not back down even an inch from our principled stand,” said Rizvi, who is also the Majlis Wahdat-e-Muslimeen’s central deputy secretary-general.

He said the main objective of the protest was to bring the issue of missing persons to light. “We are hopeful that the country’s all powerful institutions, including the prime minister, the army chief, and the judiciary, will take notice of it,” he said.

On Sunday, a large number of religious, political, social, and media personalities visited the protest camp to express solidarity with the participants of the sit-in.