With Pakistan frantically attempting to secure a much-needed loan from the IMF, an insurgency that has been going on for more than 70 years has reared its head once again.
A reported 132 security forces personnel were killed by the Baloch rebel organizations when they launched attacks against various targets throughout Balochistan. It gets worse: an already nervous Pakistan Army Chief, who sees Indian shadows behind every bush, is likely to order a counterterrorism campaign unlike anything the Baloch have ever seen.
Following Pakistan’s “usual” round of counterterrorism operations in 2021, which included “enforced disappearances” of young men and women, some of whom were later recovered bloodied and tortured, and late-night “knocks on the door,” which the Baloch had come to fear, the insurgency among the Baloch had been steadily increasing.
However, in other regions of Balochistan, militant groups with Pakistani backing, such as the Islamic State of Khorasan and Jaish ul Adl, were hiding and operating in Iran, putting pressure on the Iranian Revolutionary Guards (IRGC). This resulted in Pakistan launching retaliatory strikes on Saravan, an Iranian border settlement, and Iran conducting very unusual drone and missile raids into Panjgur in January.
The main insurgent group fighting for decades, the Balochistan Liberation Army (BLA), launched “Operation Herof,” hitting targets all over the province, identifying “Punjabis” in about 22 vehicles entering the state, setting fire to 23, and claiming to have taken control of a military camp for at least 20 hours. They also controlled important sections of the coastal highway and major roads, blowing up the main railway line to Quetta and the rail link to Iran. The group asserted that Fedayeen units and about 800 fighters had taken part in the activities.
This is war, given the scope and intensity of it. This is just the beginning, as group spokeswoman Jeeyand Baloch notes. The goal? resistance against the Pakistani army’s despised “operations” and “occupation” of Baloch territory.
Pakistan started “Azm e Istekam,” its twelfth military operation, last month. The military spokesperson clarified that unlike the other eleven operations, this one was a counterterrorism operation rather than a military one. He very much ruined it all when he said that the few people who were opposed taking drastic measures against their own people were the ones who had “politicized” the whole thing. Regardless of the title, the operation started in mid-June, less than two weeks after Prime Minister Shabaz Sharif was spotted introducing a visibly astonished General Asim Munir to none other than Xi Jinping. That wasn’t a happy visit. The attacks on Chinese engineers at Dasu many months prior infuriated the Chinese, and they did not hold back in expressing their anger.
Fitfully at first, the operation appears to have started in earnest about the middle of July. There could have been several reasons for this, but it was also the time that the Chinese declined to reschedule a rollover of debt payable to Chinese banks in advance and about Rs 401 billion in energy debt. It appears that the Chinese thought their “iron brother” was falling apart. After that, the operation got on in earnest. And “Herof” arrived as payback.
The prime minister, Shahbaz Sharif, almost immediately stated that the strikes were intended to sabotage the friendship between China and Pakistan. More practically, the cabinet decided to allot PKR 60 billion for operations, of which about Rs 20 billion needed to be released right now.
Remarkably, Shabaz assigned responsibility on the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan instead of the Baloch, despite ample proof indicating local involvement. The group has made public images of dead militants, including 22-year-old Mahal Baloch, who was a law student at Law College Turbat prior to enlisting in the BLA in 2022. She attacked the Pakistan Army facility at Bela headquarters, forcing the main gate to open and letting other fighters into the camp using an explosive-laden car. The specifics are terrible. The deceased are all in their 20s, the majority of them were middle-class students. Local insurgents are also implicated by another problem.
The BLA notes in a lengthy news release that it did not attack the Levies or the local police, in one instance holding some and then releasing them without incident. That’s hardly exactly TTP policy, which murders anybody that gets in its way. Furthermore, Pakistani forces encircled Turbat University in an attempt to search the women’s hostel as part of the unavoidable reprisal.
The BLA is a local organization, therefore it wouldn’t want to sour relations with people who back it. However, every effort is being made to portray this as an assault on “innocent civilians” and to implicate “foreigners.”
For those who were prepared to follow the constitution, the PM also extended an invitation to talk. However, the fact that Sarfaraz Bugti, their “Chief Minister,” was elected this year without opposition despite having previously supported genocide as a solution to the Baloch problem, demonstrates the strength of the Baloch people’s dominance.
It’s hardly the stuff that inspires confidence. Pakistan, meantime, is carrying out its brutal “counterterrorism” operations, including sending out its own terrorist groups to kill and betray the Baloch.
In the future, anticipate that every effort would be made to avert “Operation Herof’s” second round, which would involve severe harassment of the local populace. Although the UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination did not specifically address the Balochistani issue in its final report, the subject has garnered significant attention due to the fact that the committee took note of the situation.
Although the severe prejudice that is practiced in the nation is known, interest in the Baloch issue is minimal, especially in India, where the topic has received scant coverage in the mainstream media.
Protests by Baloch have taken place abroad, such as in Germany. These, however, are insignificant in comparison to the United States and China, which have both offered more cooperation in the fight against terrorism, and denounced the assaults. This implies more Chinese meddling in the field of intelligence, particularly in technical intelligence.
Regretfully, the BLA was likewise labeled as a terrorist organization by the US in 2017, a decision that shocked the Baloch community.
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Washington won’t alter since the separatist movement in the Baloch region also irks Iran. As this is going on, anticipate more pressure from Pakistan on the Taliban to drive Baloch out of their (ungoverned) territory. That’s probably going to be ignored by the Taliban.
If the Chinese get involved, trouble will ensue. That is a cause for concern for the Baloch. Iran is a constant source of refuge. Pakistan’s shenanigans are not well received in Teheran, especially when they engage the US and even Israel in undermining Iranian ambitions.
The Baloch people might find room between these competing ambitions to begin their next operation. The “establishment” in Pakistan, at the very least, would be inclined to believe that India was involved in the most recent bloodshed and would be eager to exact revenge. Saying that insurgencies cannot be formed is pointless because they always result from tragedies and acts of torture. Read the media, please. Very soon, things are probably going to get much more violent and difficult.
