Canaries in the Coal Mine: Confronting State Violence and Genocide Recognition in Balochistan

The crisis in Balochistan is no sudden escalation. Described by the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan as the country’s “longest-standing unresolved crisis,” the region has endured decades of enforced disappearances, extrajudicial killings, and the militarisation of civic life. Thousands have been disappeared—many never returned, while others reappeared traumatised or dead.

This panel examines how the Pakistani state continues to frame peaceful civic mobilisation—particularly by students and women—as insurgency, using it to justify crackdowns, collective punishment, and erasure. Recent mass protests led by Baloch women are being met with arbitrary arrests and violence, amid wide condemnations from the UN and Amnesty International.

By centering field journalism, survivor-led testimony, and legal resistance, this conversation explores the politics of disappearance, the criminalization of dissent, and the long-delayed call for genocide recognition.

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