[Reader-list] Pk Aman Ittehad (Peace Coalition) condemns killing of Sikhs

[yasir ~يا سر]

In the context of extra judicial killings in the areas of NWFP

Date: Tue, Feb 23, 2010 at 9:47 PM

  *PRESS RELEASE*

Pakistan Peace Coalition condemns beheading of Sikhs, demands protection to
all monitories

KARACHI, Feb. 23 – Pakistan Peace Coalition (PPP) has vehemently condemned
the terrorist acts of beheading of two Sikhs in separate incidents in Khyber
and Orakzai agencies of Federal Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) by
militants and termed them attempts to sabotage the revival of peace prcess
between Pakistan and India.

In a statement on Tuesday, PPC members expressed grief and sorrow over the
tragic murder of two Sikhs, who were earlier kidnapped by Taliban
terrorists. In the most recent incident Taliban terrorists killed Jaspal
Singh in Khyber Agency. Singh along with two others, was kidnapped by
terrorists two weeks before, and their captors were demanding ransom money
for their release. However, when the relatives agreed to pay ransom money,
the Taliban kidnappers ruthlessly beheaded Jaspal Singh and threw away his
body. While two others Sikhs - Gurjit Singh and Gurvinder Singh - are still
in their custody.

The relatives of deceased found a letter with the body warning them with
suicide attacks if the details of the beheading and kidnapping were revealed
to the media or security forces.

According to some news reports Taliban had forced Jaspal Singh to cut his
hair and convert to Islam to which he refused and they beheaded him in
retaliation. In a similar incident a month ago, Taliban had kidnapped
another Pakistani Sikh Mahal Singh in Orakzai Agency and killed him.

A small number of Sikhs are peacefully living in NWFP and tribal areas since
centuries. There have been reports that Sikhs in this region have been
subjected to Jizya - an Islamic tax that is collected from non-Muslims. All
these taxes are illegal and tantamount to challenge the writ of the
government. A large number of Sikhs have already migrated from NWFP to
various areas in Punjab in fear of Taliban militants.

All these tragic incidents have moved the entire Pakistani nation as no
civil society can tolerate such barbaric acts. The minorities in Pakistan
are already feeling insecurity in Pakistan and these types of incidents are
attempt to harass the vulnerable sections of the society. These incidents
would certainly increase uncertainty and fear among the monitories and
jeopardize the peace process in this region. A large number of Sikhs are
living in India and anti-peace elements in India may use this incident to
create hindrances in peace talks. We are confident that Indian government
would not use this incident as an excuse to further delay the peace
negotiations.

Be believe that the peace dialogue should be a continuous process without
any interference and Pakistan government should take serious measures to
protect its minorities and stern action be taken against terrorists. State
should use all its resources to get all the remaining hostages freed from
their kidnapers.

Ends

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