Reports of sectarian violence in Balochistan have grown alarmingly over the last 18 months, giving a new face to the already troubled political and security paradigm in the province. Insecurity and violence have grown with the appearance of sectarian militias in force in the province since 2012. Balochistan’s history has been largely untroubled by religious violence. The nationalist movement remains secular and focused on rights for the Baloch people, much as the society itself remains aloof from madrassahs and clerical influence. Clerics traditionally play a fringe role in Baloch society. Ethnic strife has occasionally arisen in northern Balochistan and Quetta, where the presence of a large Pashtun community creates different social and religious dynamics. However, until recently the Baloch hinterland remained untroubled by sectarianism, as different communities coexist in peace in the vast and sparsely populated province. This has begun to change following the January and February 2013 bombings in Quetta that targeted the Shia Hazara community, killing almost 250 people. These were the most devastating and widely reported of numerous instances where Hazaras were specifically targeted for being Shia, amounting to the ‘creeping’ genocide of this small community. Reports of increasing numbers of madrassahs in interior Balochistan, often aided and supported by the local administration, have coincided with growing reports of attacks on women, minority communities and schools. On Friday unidentified attackers killed six members of the tiny Zikri community in Awaran district at their place of worship in the Ziaratdan area. Local police say that four attackers on motorbikes opened fire on worshippers while they were praying. No group has claimed responsibility but recently hate messages calling for the murder of Zikris and Hindus have begun appearing in the area, spray painted on walls by a group calling itself Lashkar-e-Khorasan. Whether this group is responsible or is part of a larger sectarian outfit is unknown, but the sectarian nature of the attack in light of these developments is unequivocal. The Zikri are a tiny sect and are usually unnamed separately as they simply identify as Muslims. Estimates say there are perhaps 750,000 Zikris around the world, with the majority in Balochistan living in scattered, impoverished communities. Their places of worship, called khanqas, are distinctive because they lack a clerical pulpit and are devoted to Zikr (invocation), again pointing to the marginal role clerics play in their social life. In our increasingly intolerant society, this is apparently reason enough to kill them. However, the mushrooming of sectarian violence begs the question of whether the administration is concerned at all, or worse, tolerates sectarian groups in pursuit of strategic goals. The Lashkar-e-Jhangvi openly claimed responsibility for the bomb attacks on Hazaras, yet its leader Malik Ishaq is a free man. Whether he is being protected from prosecution is a matter of debate; that sectarian violence threatens to undo the fabric of this country is not. *