Pakistan quake highlights Balochistan ethnic fractures

[muriel_volestrangler]

Many of those who survived were deeply traumatised and suffered fractures - broken arms, ribs and head injuries. The main hospital in Awaran did not have an X-ray machine. Those who could manage to do so rushed their injured relatives to hospitals in the port city of Karachi - between six and seven hours' drive away.

Within the next 48 hours or so, when Pakistani soldiers arrived in Teertaj with a truckload of tents and food supplies, the villagers turned them away. "We told them we did not want anything to do them," says a villager.
...
Thousands of Pakistani soldiers have been deployed there, and effectively control large parts of the province. The army says it is fighting for the territorial integrity of Pakistan. It is battling separatist Baloch insurgents, who they allege are being backed by foreign forces, namely India.

But the army itself is viewed as an outsider force, as it is largely composed of ethnic Punjabis and Pashtuns. The troops are accused of carrying out large-scale enforced disappearances and custodial deaths of Baloch nationalists - charges they deny.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-24353687