Former prime minister Nawaz Sharif has instructed PML-N leaders and workers to join countrywide protests against the killing of 10 Hazara coal miners in Balochistan’s Machh, a party spokesperson said Friday.

PML-N spokesperson Marriyum Aurangzeb said in a statement that her party leader has told his workers and local leadership to join the protests of Hazara community in their respective cities.

Nawaz also instructed ex-PM Shahid Khaqan Abbasi to raise the issue of Hazara martyrs in the Pakistan Democratic Movement meeting.

The coal miners were executed by unidentified men in their sleeping room in the Machh coal field area on January 3. The attack was claimed by the Islamic State’s Wilayah Pakistan arm.

The militant group released a graphic image that showed two armed men standing next to the bodies of the coal miners.

Hazara protesters have been staging a sit-in at a highway near Quetta for the last six days and have refused to bury their loved ones. They say they won’t bury the victims until Prime Minister Imran Khan arrives in Quetta and meets families of the slain coal miners.

The protests have spread to several cities across the country now.