Via Examiner:
The militant Lashkar-i-Jhangvi has threatened to throw acid on the faces of women who venture to the bazaars in Mekran’s largest town of Turbat, according to a radio report.
“The militants sent text messages to the public that women who venture to go for shopping in the market place like the Lehri market and StarPlus market on their own would be attacked by Lashkar-i-Jhangvi,” a caller told the pro-militant Radio Gwank based in Sweden.
Balochistan has been a battleground for secular and democratic forces and Islamists for many years, but the Islamists mostly existed on the fringe of society.
During the military dictatorship of General Ziaul Haq, Saudi Arabia pumped in millions of dollars to finance hundreds of madressahs where poor Baloch students went for religious education.
“What we see now is the coming of age of the graduates of those madressahs,” said former speaker of the Balochistan assembly Mir Akram Dashti of the National Party.
There have been at least three reported cases of acid throwing in Balochistan in the last two years. According to Amnesty International, on 29 April, three sisters, Fatima, aged 20, Sakeena, aged 14 and Saima, aged 8, were disfigured by acid thrown at them in Kalat town, Balochistan, apparently for violating a ban on leaving the house without a male guardian.