GUNNER
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Pakistan Bans 5 Baloch Militant Groups
QUETTA, Pakistan, Sept 8, 2010 (AFP) - Pakistan announced a ban on five militant groups operating in the restive southwest and froze their assets on Wednesday, the country's interior minister Rehman Malik said.
Violence has surged this year in southwestern Baluchistan province, which borders Afghanistan and Iran and is rife with separatist unrest as well as Islamist militancy and sectarian violence.
"Today five of them have been proscribed. They will not be allowed to undertake any activity, their offices will be closed and action will be taken against their office bearers," Malik told reporters.
"Their bank accounts have also been seized," said Malik, speaking in Quetta, the main town of Baluchistan, where a suicide bomber killed 59 people on Friday at a Shiite Muslim rally.
The banned groups are the Baluchistan Republican Army, Baluch Liberation Front, Baluchistan Liberation United Front, Baluch Defaee Tanzeem and Lashkar-e-Baluchistan, Malik said.
Malik said any organisation using the terms "liberation", "military" or "Lashkar" (army) in Pakistan's insurgency-torn southwestern Baluchistan province would also face a ban.
Hundreds of people have died since Baluch rebels rose up in 2004 demanding political autonomy and a greater share of profits from the region's wealth of natural oil, gas and mineral resources.
Militants up and down the country's western areas have launched a series of assaults over the past week as Muslims mark the final days of the holy fasting month of Ramadan.
QUETTA, Pakistan, Sept 8, 2010 (AFP) - Pakistan announced a ban on five militant groups operating in the restive southwest and froze their assets on Wednesday, the country's interior minister Rehman Malik said.
Violence has surged this year in southwestern Baluchistan province, which borders Afghanistan and Iran and is rife with separatist unrest as well as Islamist militancy and sectarian violence.
"Today five of them have been proscribed. They will not be allowed to undertake any activity, their offices will be closed and action will be taken against their office bearers," Malik told reporters.
"Their bank accounts have also been seized," said Malik, speaking in Quetta, the main town of Baluchistan, where a suicide bomber killed 59 people on Friday at a Shiite Muslim rally.
The banned groups are the Baluchistan Republican Army, Baluch Liberation Front, Baluchistan Liberation United Front, Baluch Defaee Tanzeem and Lashkar-e-Baluchistan, Malik said.
Malik said any organisation using the terms "liberation", "military" or "Lashkar" (army) in Pakistan's insurgency-torn southwestern Baluchistan province would also face a ban.
Hundreds of people have died since Baluch rebels rose up in 2004 demanding political autonomy and a greater share of profits from the region's wealth of natural oil, gas and mineral resources.
Militants up and down the country's western areas have launched a series of assaults over the past week as Muslims mark the final days of the holy fasting month of Ramadan.