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03-02-2025
Bureau Report
ISLAMABAD: At least 18 paramilitary soldiers and 24 armed attackers have been killed in two related incidents in southwestern Pakistan, according to officials and local media reports, as sectarian, ethnic and separatist violence escalates in the region.
Pakistan’s military on Saturday said fighters tried to set up roadblocks overnight in the restive province of Balochistan, and most of the deaths took place as security forces removed them.
A vehicle “carrying unarmed Frontier Corps paramilitaries” near the town of Mangochar “came under gunfire from 70 to 80 armed assailants who had blocked the road”, a police official told media.
The officer said three other paramilitaries were seriously injured while two escaped unharmed.
In a statement, the Baloch Liberation Army claimed responsibility for the attack on the paramilitary, but gave a lower death toll of 17.
At least 11 of the attackers were killed in what the military described as follow-up “clearance operations” on Saturday.
Pakistan’s Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif in a statement condemned the attack.
The mineral-rich Balochistan, which borders Iran and Afghanistan, has been the scene of a decade-old rebellion by separatist ethnic Baloch groups. Several armed groups also operate there.
On Tuesday, in a separate incident, attackers in an explosive-laden vehicle were thwarted in their attempt to overrun a Pakistani security post near the border with Afghanistan.
In January, at least six people were killed in an attack also claimed by the BLA, one of the main separatist groups in the region. In November, the BLA also said it carried out coordinated attacks that killed at least 39 people, one of the highest tolls in the region.
In August, at least 73 people were killed in Balochistan when separatist fighters attacked police stations, railway lines and highways, and security forces launched retaliatory operations.
The violence also comes in the backdrop of worsening relations between Pakistan and the Taliban rulers of Afghanistan.
A similarly dramatic uptick in attacks has been witnessed elsewhere in Pakistan in recent months, including in northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province.
In 2024 alone, the military reported 383 soldiers and 925 fighters killed in various border area clashes.
The Pakistani government and Afghan Taliban have a long history of working together, but tensions are now on the rise. Hameed Hakimi, Senior Fellow at CHS Doha, breaks down what is happening.
In August, last year nearly two dozen civilians travelling from Pakistan’s Punjab province were pulled from their vehicles and shot dead by armed gunmen, as a series of at least six deadly attacks battered the country’s southwestern province of Balochistan on Sunday night and Monday morning.
At least 74 people were killed in the attacks that marked an escalation in violence even for Balochistan, a region where a decades-long armed separatist movement has meant frequent clashes between fighters and security forces.
The separatist group Baloch Liberation Army (BLA), which claimed responsibility for the latest attacks, said in a statement that it targeted security forces and took control of highways across the province.
