Baloch National Jirga
Welcome to the Committee Page for the Baloch National Jirga! Here, you can find details on the committee and the students who are chairing it, download the background guide, and learn about suggested primary source reading for the committee. Check the page regularly for committee updates.
Committee Dais
Chair: Doris CarrionVice Chair: Maggie Herman
Crisis Director: Nuriel Moghavem
Contact Email: baloch@cmunce.org
Recent Updates
[January 5, 2009]: Baloch pictures added. Please view under "Recommended Resources and Documents" at bottom of page.
[November 15, 2008]: The Background guide has been posted.
[May 2008]: Welcome to the Baloch National Jirga webpage. Keep your eyes peeled to this site in the coming month for updates.
Committee Description
In the mountains, deserts, and river valleys east of the Iranian plateau, the province of Balochistan is a crossroads between Central, South, and East Asia on one end and between Central Asia and the Persian Gulf and the Middle East on the other. Seeped in a rich tribal culture, the Baloch people have been living in the region since 1,200 BCE. Trapped in a world that was dividing itself into nation-states, in the 19th century these cattle-herders found themselves split between Iran, Afghanistan, and British India, the latter of which is now Pakistan, India, and Bangladesh. Our committee will focus on the decades-old struggle of the Baloch in Pakistan, who have been fighting the central Pakistani government since 1973 over what they believe to be the violation of their rights to the region's natural resources and tax revenue. The battle between the Baloch liberation armies and Pakistan's successive military governments has been bloody and tragic as entire Baloch villages have been bombed to punish attacks by individual Baloch revolutionaries.
The Baloch National Jirga committee will simulate an assembly of Baloch tribal leaders; this grand jirga will be only the third of its kind to be called since 1878. The Baloch today face a complicated national and regional environment, with many factors working to both help and hinder their cause of independence or greater autonomy. With General Pervez Musharraf's resignation on August 18, 2008, will the new Pakistani government have the power or control to pay attention to the Baloch people's grievances, or will the military take over once again and brutally repress the poverty-stricken but determined Balochis? Will Iran intervene, to prevent an uprising by its own Baloch population? Will India once again help a suppressed minority of Pakistan (and protect its energy transit route), as it did during the Bangladesh Liberation War of 1971? Will the Taliban move into the region further, as they have already begun to do as they are driven out of their camps in the northwest? As the tribal leaders and revolutionary generals representing the Baloch people, delegates will have to make the difficult decisions of who their friends and enemies are, how much violence is necessary or justified, and how much they can reasonably demand from the Pakistani government and/or from their allies in the region.
Background Guide
Recommended Resources and Documents