Protests Held In Support Of Pashtun Human Rights Activist Across Pakistan, Afghanistan

Hundreds of thousands of people protested on Tuesday in northwestern Pakistani province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa against an arrest of Manzoor Pashteen, a human rights activist and the chairman of the Pashtun Tahaffuz Movement (PTM), while rallies in support of Pashteen were also held in nine provinces of neighboring Afghanistan, a Sputnik correspondent reported

KABUL (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 28th January, 2020) Hundreds of thousands of people protested on Tuesday in northwestern Pakistani province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa against an arrest of Manzoor Pashteen, a human rights activist and the chairman of the Pashtun Tahaffuz Movement (PTM), while rallies in support of Pashteen were also held in nine provinces of neighboring Afghanistan, a Sputnik correspondent reported.

Pakistani police arrested Pashteen, a known critic of the government and the armed forces, on Sunday on sedition charges in the northern city of Peshawar. The activist often claimed that members of the military committed extrajudicial killings and were engaged in forced disappearances.

The main demand of protesters was the immediate release of the PTM leader.

"We want the release of Manzoor Pashteen, he wants to defend the rights of the Pashtuns and we are fighting without violence," PTM member Ismail Masid told Sputnik.

Another member of the organization called on the international community to pay more attention to the Pashtuns and their rights' violations.

Furthermore, PTM senior member Mohsin Dawar was arrested in Islamabad in the wake of protests.

Dawar then sent a video message where he threatened to "show the real face of this [Pakistani] government to the international community."

Rallies were also held in other provinces and in several major cities, namely Islamabad, Lahore and Karachi. Moreover, people in many cities across neighboring Afghanistan, including Kabul, Kandahar, Khost and Herat, protested in solidarity with PTM leader and called for his release.

"Manzoor Pashteen and his friends have started a peaceful campaign, Pakistan does not say anything to terrorists in their territory, but Pashtuns who have started a peaceful campaign face a backlash from the government, they get arrested and called terrorists," Arshad Raghand, one of the protesters in Kabul, said.

PTM was founded in 2014 by eight university students with an aim to remove landmines in the war-affected regions of northwestern Pakistan. Later on, the movement started campaigns for defending the rights of Pashtun people and demanded justice for victims of extrajudicial killings, enforced disappearances and alleged torture while in custody of security forces.