Protests over the killing of 11 Shia Hazara minority coal miners by Islamic State (IS) militants on Sunday have spread to other cities in Pakistan, including the economic powerhouse of Karachi.
Police said yesterday that there were sit-ins in at least 19 locations in the sprawling southern metropolis.
Flights were delayed because access to the airport had been affected.
The 11 coal miners were targeted following an armed attack at Balochistan’s Machh coal field, about 48km east of the provincial capital Quetta.
Armed men took the coal miners to nearby mountains, where the victims were executed.
Six of the miners were killed on the spot, and five who were critically injured died on the way to a hospital.
Initial investigation revealed the attackers identified the miners as being from a Shia Hazara community, took them away for execution, leaving others unharmed.
Hundreds of Hazara have been killed in Pakistan over the last decade in attacks by religious militant groups and by IS militants.
Attacks have included bombings in schools and crowded markets and brazen ambushes of buses along Pakistani roads.
The protesters have asked Prime Minister Imran Khan to visit Quetta, where demonstrators have kept up a five-day long vigil alongside coffins carrying the victims’ bodies, blocking a major highway.
Despite extremely harsh weather as the mercury drops to below freezing point in Quetta, the mourners, including women and children, have refused to leave until the premier meets them and the killers are brought to justice.
Interior Minister Sheikh Rashid Ahmed, who had met the protesters on Monday, has announced that Rs2.5mn would be paid to each victim’s family as compensation.
The Balochistan government has meanwhile constituted a joint investigation committee to probe into the tragic incident in Machh.
The decision was taken at a high-level meeting chaired by Baluchistan Chief Minister Jam Kamal Khan in Quetta yesterday.
Chief Secretary Captain (retired) Fazeel Asghar briefed the meeting about the attack in Machh.
The prime minister has meanwhile decided in principle to visit Quetta, local media reported yesterday.
As per details, the date and time of Khan’s visit will be kept secret owing to security concerns.
Following the attack, Prime Minister Khan took to Twitter, assuring the families of the Machh massacre victims that he will soon visit Quetta and offer his condolence to them personally.
“I share your pain & have come to you before also to stand with you in your time of suffering,” Khan tweeted on Wednesday. “I will come again very soon to offer prayers and console with all the families personally.”
He also appealed to them to bury the victims, which the protesters have refused until their demands are met.
Most of the victims in the attack on Sunday were seasonal migrant workers from an impoverished area of neighbouring Afghanistan.
Their killings were filmed and later posted online by the Islamic State.
The Afghanistan consulate in Quetta has said that seven of the victims were Afghan, and have requested that the Pakistani authorities to repatriate three of the bodies.
After nearly 100 Hazaras were killed in a 2013 bombing in Quetta, sit-ins were held across Pakistan that only ended after the then-prime minister met with the mourners.
People chant slogans demanding justice at a protest yesterday in Karachi, following the killings of coal miners from the Shia Hazara minority in an attack in Machh.
