LAHORE: Fifty-two-year-old Anwari Mai keeps an old black and white photograph of her son on the kitchen shelf of her house in a village near Gujranwala.  Maiâs son Qayyum stares out from the faded picture with a straggly beard making him look older than his 19 years. Today, Qayyum would be nearly 23. Qayyum is among the increasing number of âdisappearedâ people in the country. Nearly four years ago he was recruited by an extremist organisation to battle the US-led coalition in Afghanistan. Anwari Mai and her husband, Saleem, believe their son returned from Afghanistan in 2003 along with other Pakistani prisoners who were handed back by Kabul but they have no idea where he is being held, nor even if heâs still alive. They suspect he may be in jail somewhere in the Punjab province.
| Is that violins I hear in the background? Anybody got a bandaid? I think my heart's bleeding... |
âItâs a bad situation. We believe many people who came back from Afghanistan are being kept in jails here. There are no charges against them and therefore no hope they will be freed by the courts or at least awarded a specific jail term. Often, their families have no idea where they are detained, according to what we know,â said Brigadier (r) Rao Abid, in charge of the Vulnerable Prisoners Project at the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP).
| Hopefully in unventilated shipping containers someplace unpleasant... |
He believes that like Qayyum, a large percentage of those who went to Afghanistan were misguided, confused young men, susceptible to the propaganda of the fundamentalist âjihadiâ groups. Currently, though the precise figures are unknown, HRCP believes that 300 or more such men may have been jailed in the Punjab alone.
| I believe a large percentage of those who went to Afghanistan were misguided, confused young wannabe krazed killers, little Nek Mohammads. Every one of them disposed of makes the world a safer place. |
But these are far from being the only missing people in the Pakistan. âMissingâ was a term rarely heard in the local context before but things have changed since Washingtonâs âwar on terrorâ began after the 9/11 attacks. The countryâs Anti-Terrorism Act was amended in 2002 to include various provisions that HRCP has described as âdraconianâ, particularly the power to sanction the detention of suspected militants without charge for up to a year. In the view of rights groups, this law has frequently been used unjustly against citizens. Dr Aafia Siddiqui, who vanished in April 2003, is perhaps Pakistanâs best-known âmissingâ person. Aafia vanished from Karachi along with her three small children. Some reports have suggested she was in the custody of Pakistani intelligence agencies, while others indicate that she is being held in the US.
| Yeah. I've got her in my basement. We just decided to snatch her for no reason... |
The academic and her husband were named on a list of wanted people compiled by the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) being accused of having links with the Al Qaeda network. Her mother in Karachi, Ismet Siddiqui, continues to demand information about her daughter and her grandchildren, as well as details of any charges brought against her in the two years since she âdisappearedâ.
| Demand and be damned. You play the game, you take your lumps. |
Estimates of the number of missing people vary, according to HRCP, between âseveral hundred and several thousandâ. More accurate figures are hard to obtain, with government officials extremely reluctant to divulge any information on the subject. |