Baba Jan | Links

Pakistan: Repression of tenants at Okara Military Farms continue, Baba Jan's final review petition underway

By Farooq Tariq September 25, 2017 — Links International Journal of Socialist Renewal reposted from Europe Solidaire Sans Frontières — The repression of tenants at Okara Military Farms continue for the last one and half years. On 21st September, Malik Salim Jakkar was arrested in Okara once again. He had spent most of the last two years (2015-2017) in jail and some two months back, he was released on bail.Malik Salim Jakhar along his five friends came to see me a night before his arrest in Lahore, his first meeting after his release. However, he was arrested very next day. He has been facing 95 police cases, he was released only after he tendered an unconditional apology to the authorities. Despite that, he is arrested because many hundreds of peasants met him during his brief freedom.

Gilgit-Baltistan (Pakistan): Religious institutions mobilised for a smear campaign against Baba Jan and his party

Awami Workers Party GB leader and Federal Committee member Baba Jan, who is serving life term in jail with AWP Hunza District party leaders (L to R) Muhammad Ramazan, Engineer Amanullah, Ikram Jamal, and Akhon Bai after appearing in a lower court in Hunza on Wednesday (picture).

By Farooq Tariq

March 11, 2017 — Links International Journal of Socialist Renewal — While this great son of the mountains is incarcerating in jail for raising voice for the rights of the people of GB and all working class people of Pakistan, the stooges of imperialist neo-colonial powers and some elements in the religious institutions and community organisations at the behest of the Establishment have once again launched a smear campaign against Baba Jan and his party.

Class "justice": Baba Jan and his comrades sentenced to 40 years in prison

By Jan Malewski August 3, 2016 -- Links International Journal of Socialist Renewal reposted from International Viewpoint -- Accused without evidence of acts that he could not have committed, since he was at the time about sixty kilometres away, Baba Jan was tortured, convicted and then acquitted on appeal. He came second in the elections in 2015 while imprisoned and was tipped to win a by-election. Now our comrade, who is vice-president of the Awami Workers Party (AWP) of Pakistan and leader of the party in the Gilgit-Baltistan region, was sentenced by the Supreme Court of Appeal in this region occupied and administered by Pakistan, on June 8, 2016, to 40 years in prison and a fine of 500,000 rupees, under a special law, called "anti-terrorist." Eight other activists - Iftikhar Hussain, Aleem, Irfan Ali, Shukurullah Baig, Sarfraz, Rasheed, Musa and Sher Khan – received the same sentence. [1]

Appeal for international solidarity: Free Baba Jan and 11 other political activists and stop the abuse of anti-terrorism

By Awami Workers Party July 11, 2016 -- Links International Journal of Socialist Renewal -- On the 8th of June 2016, the Supreme Appellate Court in Gilgit-Baltistan upheld the decision of an Anti-Terrorist Court in GB in September 2014[1] and sentenced Baba Jan (central leader of the left-wing Awami Workers Party - Gilgit Baltistan) and 11 other activists[2] to 40 year prison terms under the Anti-Terrorist Act.[3] The three-member SAC bench gave a two-to-one split verdict on the state’s appeal against the unanimous decision of the Gilgit Baltistan Chief Court two-member bench to acquit Baba Jan and others of terrorism and violence charges in April 2015. Despite what the severity of the sentence appears to imply, Baba Jan and his companions are not militants who had taken up arms against the state – they are progressive political activists and organizers who had simply raised their voice for the plight of displaced persons of the 2010 natural disaster in Attabad, Hunza and organized them against government corruption and delay in payment of the compensation funds and their resettlement.

Gilgit Baltistan (Pakistan): AWP launch mass campaign against Baba Jan and other activists’ prison sentence

June 22, 2016 -- Links International Journal of Socialist Renewal reposted from Awami Workers' Party -- Gilgit-Baltistan Supreme Appellate Court’s decision to overturn Chief Court’s acquittal of Baba Jan and 11 other Awami Workers Party activists is politically motivated. It does not meet the standards of impartiality and fairness. “If highlighting this shortcoming of the short order is tantamount to contempt of court, I am in contempt of court,” Awami Workers' Party (AWP) Pakistan president Abid Hassan Minto said on June 15. He was addressing a press conference to announce launching of a mass campaign for Baba Jan and other activists’ immediate release and cancellation of all politically-motivated cases registered against them on trumped up charges of terrorism.