We want the right to live on our own land without persecution
Mahrang Baloch, Nobel Peace Prize nominee, convicted of terrorism and murder in connection with 2024 protest death despite denying charges. Her activism focused on thousands of alleged enforced disappearances in Balochistan, including her own father who disappeared in 2009 and was later found tortured.
- Dr Mahrang Baloch sentenced to life imprisonment on terrorism and murder charges in June 2026
- Her father disappeared in 2009, found tortured and killed nearly three years later
- Activists estimate 7,000 enforced disappearances in Balochistan; government claims 80% of 2,900 reported cases resolved
- She led a thousand-mile march to Islamabad in late 2023 with hundreds of women demanding information on missing relatives
- Nominated for Nobel Peace Prize in 2025; arrested in March 2025 during a protest in Quetta
Pakistani anti-terrorism court sentenced human rights activist Dr Mahrang Baloch to life imprisonment for terrorism and sedition charges related to enforced disappearances advocacy in Balochistan province.
Dr Mahrang Baloch was sixteen when her father vanished. Abdul Ghaffar Langove, a political activist himself, was allegedly arrested by security forces in 2009 and never came home. Nearly three years later, the family received a phone call. His body had been found in Lasbela district, in the south of Balochistan province. When it arrived, he was wearing the same torn clothes he had disappeared in. He had been badly tortured.
That loss would define the rest of her life. Years later, after her brother was also picked up by security forces and detained for nearly three months, Mahrang made a choice. She would fight. She became a doctor, then an activist, and eventually one of the most recognizable faces of a movement demanding answers about the thousands of people who have vanished in Balochistan over the past two decades. In 2024, she was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize. In 2025, she was arrested. This week, a Pakistani anti-terrorism court sentenced her to life imprisonment.
The charges against her are terrorism, sedition, and murder in connection with the death of a paramilitary soldier during a protest in the town of Gwadar in 2024. She denies them all. Her sister Nadia, who is part of her legal team, says the family will appeal. But when asked if she has visited Mahrang in prison, Nadia paused. "I don't have the courage to see her," she said, because she feels she has failed her by not securing her justice.
Balochistan is Pakistan's largest province, covering about 44 percent of the country's territory. It is rich with gas, coal, copper, and gold. Yet it has been locked out of progress. Access to many parts is restricted for security reasons. Infrastructure is poor, electricity is sporadic, water is scarce. The province became part of Pakistan in 1948, after the partition of British India, despite opposition from tribal leaders who wanted independence. That resistance turned militant, stoked by accusations that Islamabad has exploited the region's resources without investing in its development.
Activists and human rights groups say thousands of ethnic Baloch people have disappeared over the past two decades, many allegedly detained by security forces without due process, abducted, tortured, and killed as part of operations against a long-running separatist insurgency. The Pakistan government denies this, insisting many of the missing have joined separatist groups or fled the country. The government claims that of more than 2,900 disappearance cases reported since 2011, around 80 percent have been resolved. Activists put the actual number of disappearances much higher, at around 7,000. There is no reliable data and no way to verify either claim.
Mahrang led the Baloch Yakjehti Committee, a movement campaigning against enforced disappearances and human rights abuses while advocating greater control over Balochistan's natural resources. She organized long marches, led protests, and gave voice to families—especially women—searching for missing relatives. In late 2023, she led hundreds of women on a thousand-mile march to the capital, Islamabad, to demand information about their family members. She was arrested twice during that journey. In March 2025, she was arrested again while leading a protest in Quetta after thirteen unclaimed bodies were buried in the city.
Her sister has questioned the integrity of the trial. Mahrang's lawyers were changed during the proceedings, she was assigned state lawyers, and she was not given access to witnesses' accounts or their details. "It was not transparent," Nadia says. The family remains determined to fight. Before her arrest, Mahrang told the BBC she knew imprisonment was a possibility but wasn't fearful. She had said then: "We want the right to live on our own land without persecution. We want our resources, our rights. We want this rule of fear and violence to end." Now, her family says, she remains resolute. The struggle will continue.
Citações Notáveis
We will challenge this decision in the higher courts. It was not transparent. Her lawyers were changed as we went on a protest demanding an open court trial; she was assigned state lawyers; she was not given access to witnesses' accounts or their details.— Nadia Baloch, Mahrang's sister and member of her legal team
They think dumping bodies will end this. But how can anyone forget losing their loved one this way? No human can endure this.— Dr Mahrang Baloch, in an interview before her arrest
A Conversa do Hearth Outra perspectiva sobre a história
Why does her case matter beyond Balochistan itself?
Because it shows what happens when you document state violence. Mahrang didn't pick up a weapon. She organized women to search for their dead. And for that, she's facing life in prison.
The government says the charges are about a soldier's death, not her activism.
That's the mechanism. You take a real incident—a death during a protest—and you use it to prosecute the person who organized the protest. It's how you criminalize dissent without saying you're criminalizing dissent.
Her father disappeared in 2009. That's sixteen years ago. Why is she still fighting?
Because thousands of families are still waiting. Some have been waiting longer than she has. When your father comes back as a tortured corpse, you don't move on. You ask why. And when the state won't answer, you keep asking.
What does a life sentence actually mean for her movement?
It's meant to break it. But her sister said the struggle will continue. That's the real answer. You can imprison one person. You can't imprison the families still searching for their missing.
Is there any chance the appeal succeeds?
The trial itself was compromised—lawyers changed, no access to evidence, state-appointed counsel. But appealing in Pakistan's system takes years. Meanwhile, she's in a cell. That's the point.