Arman Loni

Mohammad Ibrahim Arman Loni (محمد ابراهیم ارمان لوڼی), commonly known as Arman Loni (or Arman Luni), was a Pakistani teacher of Pashto literature, poet, and one of the founding leaders of the Pashtun Tahafuz Movement (PTM).

After his master's degree, Arman successfully passed the Balochistan Public Service Commission test in 2012 and became a lecturer of Pashto literature at Degree College Quetta.

He was the founder of "Pashtun Progressive Writers" (پښتانه مترقي لیکوال, Paṣhtānə Mutaraqī Līkwāl), an organization aimed at nurturing the new generation of Pashtun authors.

Arman was an active member of the Pashtunkhwa Milli Awami Party (PMAP) and its student wing, the Pashtunkhwa Students Organization (PSO), since his student life.

When Arman was a 14-year-old student of the 7th grade, he started working as a waiter at the restaurant where his elder brother, Muhammad Qasim, also worked.

Arman would take over Qasim's duties during the second half of his shift.

Arman received his early education in Sanjawi and completed his master's degree in Pashto at the University of Balochistan, Quetta.

While pursuing his education, Arman also started working seasonally as a clerk at coal mines, and part-time as a tailor, to support his family financially.

Despite the economic hardships, Arman started taking part in political activities of the Pashtunkhwa Milli Awami Party and became a human rights activist during his student life.

Later on, Arman also pursued his Master of Philosophy degree.

He wrote a thesis on "using metaphors in Pashto folklore literature against colonial enemies," a topic which mirrored his political thoughts.

He and his younger sister, Wranga Loni, joined the Pashtun Tahafuz Movement (PTM, "Pashtun Protection Movement") as soon as it emerged in February 2018.

Both Arman and Wranga Loni actively took part in organizing the PTM public gatherings, usually traveling to the gathering site a week earlier to help run awareness campaigns among the locals.

At the gatherings, Wranga would mostly give speeches from the stage but Arman would usually prefer to be behind the scenes.

His family was threatened by Pakistani law enforcement agencies and pro-government tribal elders for their activities in the Pashtun Tahafuz Movement.

The Loni tribal chief warned Arman to stop his activities and told him that the agencies would not tolerate it.

Consequently, Arman's family was forced to move from Sanjawi to Killa Saifullah, the hometown of Nawab Ayaz Jogezai, the Pashtun tribal chief who offered them refuge.

Arman then transferred himself from Degree College Quetta to Degree College Killa Saifullah to live with his family.

Arman was arrested on 12 May 2018 before the PTM public gathering in Karachi, but he resumed his activism immediately after his release.

Arman died on 2 February 2019 after a clash with the police, which followed his participation at a protest sit-in outside Loralai Press Club.

The four-day sit-in had been organized by PTM activists, including Arman and his sister Wranga Loni, to protest against the 2019 Loralai attack, in which eight policemen and a civilian had been killed by the Pakistani Taliban on 29 January 2019.

His family and PTM activists said that as the police attacked him and other activists, a policeman struck Arman on the head with a gun, causing him to collapse.

However, according to a police spokesman, the death was caused by a heart attack following clashes between protesters and police.

PTM activists were prevented from visiting him at the hospital, and by the time they managed to do so a few hours later, he had died.

The postmortem reports indicated no torture marks on his body but there was a blood clot in his brain.

In a parliamentary panel, the Pakistani senators Farhatullah Babar and Muhammad Ali Saif supported the claims made by Arman's family and said that according to their information, the postmortem noted some critical marks in his brain, indicating that the head injury had caused some blood clots in the brain which led to his death.

Mohsin Dawar, a Pakistani parliamentarian and PTM leader, said that an application to lodge a first information report (FIR) for the murder was submitted against the prime suspect assistant superintendent of police (ASP) Attaur Rehman Tareen, a retired Pakistan Air Force officer.

The police, however, refused to lodge an FIR, which was criticized by Shireen Mazari, the Human Rights Minister of Pakistan.

On February 3, the Balochistan Chief Minister Jam Kamal Khan took notice of Arman's death and sought an official report from the commissioner of Zhob Division within 48 hours.

On February 4, the Pashtunkhwa Milli Awami Party (PMAP) and other allied political parties observed a 'shutter down' strike in Balochistan in protest against the murder.

PTM also held widespread protests in reaction to the murder, during which dozens of its activists, including Gulalai Ismail and Abdullah Nangyal, were arrested by Pakistani authorities.

The arrests received widespread criticism, including condemnation from Afghan President Ashraf Ghani and the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP).

Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch called on Pakistani officials to transparently investigate the death, with the former also calling on the authorities to immediately release the PTM activists arrested for protesting against the murder.

On 14 March 2022, the Pashtun National Jirga in Bannu demanded that Arman's death be investigated by a credible judicial commission headed by Justice Qazi Faez Isa, and that the report be made public.

Arman belonged to a modest family from Sanjawi in the Ziarat District of Balochistan, Pakistan.

He belonged to the Loni Durrani tribe of the Pashtuns, and his father was a driver.

Arman was a fan of football.

He had three daughters, Mina, Awesta, and Hila.

His younger sister, Wranga Loni, is also a human rights activist and writer.

On 30 January 2019, just three days before his death, Arman organized a sit-in in Karachi against the arrest of fellow PTM activist Alamzaib Mahsud, who had been arrested on 21 January 2019 after the second PTM gathering in Karachi.