Quetta, Balochistan

[farhan_9909]

BRA commander, 23 companions surrender to FC

Last Updated On 04 October,2013 About 1 week ago



DERA BUGTI (Dunya News) – Hasil Khan, a fugitive commander of banned Balochistan Republican Army along with his 23 companions surrendered to Director General Frontier Corps Balochistan.
Hasil Khan had been involved in several terrorism activities during last eight years.

It is worth mentioning here that the Balochistan government had invited all militant groups of the nationalists in the province to surrender to the authorities while the government would withdraw all the cases against them and financial support would also be provided to them. After the announcement of the Balochistan government, more than 60 persons have surrendered to the authorities during last six months.

Dunya News: Pakistan:-BRA commander, 23 companions surrender to FC...

[farhan_9909]

By Ahmar Mustikhan

QUETTA:?One of the main founders of the Baloch Liberation Front, who has launched his own separate militant group, has expressed his dismay over the political degeneration of the Balochistan liberation struggle.

Sattar Baloch, who faced third-degree torture at the hands of Pakistani intelligence services during the military regime of Gen. Pervez Musharraf, told this scribe from his mountain hideout in Mekran, \\\"Any one who wants to settle blood disputes is now joining the Baloch Liberation Front to carry out a killing.\\\"

Though Sattar Baloch was one of the main founders of the B.L.F., he along with Saleem Baloch opposed the B.L.F. policy of targeting unarmed civilians. The duo along with their comrades later launched the Baloch National Liberation Front. Sattar Baloch said, "What started as a struggle against the state has degenerated into a war against the common Baloch people." He added,"There is so much dirt now. The situation is getting worse by the day and we see no chance of betterment."

He said in Mekran, the Frontier Corps has killed 500 Baloch people, while the Baloch Liberation Front has killed upwards of 300 local Baloch and the Baloch Republican Army has killed six Baloch people. "Even common Baloch picnickers and hunters are not being spared.They are being beaten up and humiliated and their hunting guns snatched," he deplored.

He condemned the abduction in Tump of Fazul Baloch, 18, a young son of well-known Baloch poet Bashir Bedaar. "The young man was badly beaten up by the B.L.F. militants," Sattar Baloch said, adding, "Decent people belonging to the trading class are being humiliated on a daily basis." He said Mekran was facing economic and educational ruin because of the wrong actions of the militants.

"The building of a college and a 50-bed hospital in Tump was stopped by militants belonging to the Baloch Republican Army," he said. Sattar Baloch said the B.R.A. logic for the action was that the building of the college and hospital would ensure smooth supplies of ration for a Frontier Corps camp nearby.

He said one month ago Naseeb Baloch, 22, was target killed by the B.R.A. outside Turbat city on a charge that he was an informer in the abduction case of Sher Mohammed Baloch, Ghulam Mohammed Baloch and Lala Munir Baloch. The three leaders were abducted from the chamber of their lawyer Kachkol Ali Advocate by the Pakistani security forces, tortured and their bodies dumped in the first week of April 2009.

"All three were doing open politics and roaming freely. Who would need to spy on them? They do not even know what accusations to cook up, Sattar Baloch said. He said the main leaders based in the West do not seem to have any grip on the local militants. The B.R.A. is led by Geneva based Brahumdagh Bugti, 33, who is a grandson of slain governor and chief minister of Balochistan, Nawab Akbar Khan Bugti. The B.R.A. operation from Geneva is allegedly being directed by Brahumdagh Bugti, along with his right-hand man Sher Mohammed Bugti.

Observers in Geneva say the Swiss government has strict laws against terrorism and the Swiss authorities are likely to ask Brahumdah Bugti to quit militancy or leave their peaceful, scenic country.

Movement has gone into the political gutter, says renegade BLF founder - Baltimore Foreign Policy | Examiner.com

Key Points from the above article.

* Swiss government has strict laws against terrorism and the Swiss authorities are likely to ask Brahumdah Bugti to quit militancy or leave their peaceful, scenic country.

* The B.R.A. operations from Geneva are allegedly being directed by Brahumdagh Bugti, along with his right-hand man Sher Mohammed Bugti.

* The building of a college and a 50-bed hospital in Tump was stopped by militants belonging to the Baloch Republican Army," he said. Sattar Baloch said the B.R.A. logic for the action was that the building of the college and hospital would ensure smooth supplies of ration for a Frontier Corps camp nearby

* Decent people belonging to the trading class are being humiliated on a daily basis

* Mekran is facing economic and educational ruin because of the wrong actions of the militants

* Baloch Liberation Front has killed upwards of 300 local Baloch people.

* Baloch Republican Army has killed six Baloch people. "Even common Baloch picnickers and hunters are not being spared''.

* What started as a struggle against the state has degenerated into a war against the common Baloch people.

* Sattar Baloch along with Saleem Baloch opposed the B.L.F. policy of targeting unarmed civilians. The duo along with their comrades later launched the Baloch National Liberation Front

Courtesy cb4 and Aeronaut

[Oracle]

Very nice.

Two people talking to each other about genocides committed and liking each others' posts. Wonderful!

[notorious_eagle]

Very nice.

Two people talking to each other about genocides committed and liking each others' posts. Wonderful!

Do you even know the meaning of the word 'Genocide'? Here, i will help you out.

"the policy of deliberately killing a nationality or ethnic group"

Genocide | Define Genocide at Dictionary.com

[farhan_9909]

Well India's Millions of Dollars is going down the drain.

The Govt must have already given lectures to RAW,As to why even after investing so much huge in the insurgency.They are quiting this early

[1980s]

Interesting piece on the Awaran area

'Within the next 48 hours or so, when Pakistani soldiers arrived in Teertaj with a truckload of tents and food supplies, the villagers turned them away. "We told them we did not want anything to do them," says a villager.'

BBC News - Pakistan quake highlights Balochistan ethnic fractures

2013-10-16
Army forces its way into Mashky-Gajjar, distributes aid

Mahvish Ahmad

MASHKY: It was 6 O’clock on Monday morning as this correspondent suddenly woke to the loud sounds of explosion in the otherwise sleepy town of Mashky-Gajjar, as the army troops entered the town centre to take control where the Balochistan Liberation Front (BLF), a banned separatist militant group, had been quite active and in recent weeks many separatists organisations had remained involved in helping thousands of quake-affected residents.

As all hell broke loose this correspondent witnessed residents of earthquake-hit Mashky-Gajjar fleeing the city on motorbikes and taking shelter in makeshift huts as army troops entered the town. When this correspondent left the scene at around 5.30pm, foot soldiers were seen on the streets of Mashky, and helicopters were seen making rounds above the area. According to local contacts, the operation continued on its second day on Tuesday. The ongoing skirmishes are reportedly taking place in the outskirts of Mashky-Gajjar, a town in Balochistan’s southern Awaran district, which is one of the epicentres of a series of earthquakes that hit between Sept 24 and Sept 28, leaving more than 500 dead, 25,000 families homeless and 300,000 people affected.

The army gained control of a medical camp run by the Balochistan National Movement (BNM) and the Balochistan Student Organisation-Azad (BSO-Azad) – two separatist political groups operating in Awaran and parts of southern Balochistan. A local eyewitness told Dawn that nearly 500 people were rounded up and released on Monday. Dr Manan, the general-secretary of the BNM, called Dawn on Tuesday and reported that an additional 150 young boys, men and elders were picked up on the second day of the operation. According to Dr Manan, boys as young as 13 years old were among those rounded up and beaten by the security forces. Dawn has been unable to confirm the operation with the Pakistan Army.

An Edhi ambulance driver told this correspondent that the soldiers fired shots into the air as they entered the medical camp at around 6.30am on Monday. At one point he too was severely beaten up. A local resident housing this correspondent said that neighbours had been pulled out of their beds, as they were sleeping under mosquito nets in the open, and out of makeshift huts that had been constructed by neighbours after the earthquake. Dawn witnessed that men who were seen leaving their homes on motorbikes failed to return, prompting concerns in their families that they had been picked up by the army. One local resident claimed that the army stopped men on motorbikes, asking them why “they were in such a hurry to leave”. A local eyewitness at the medical camp heard the army threaten to round up anyone on a motorbike, insisting that the men arrive at the medical camp on foot.

According to the eyewitness, a representative of the army announced that the “Pakistan Army had come to stay for the next five years”, and that the residents had “nothing to fear”. “We have come to help you in your time of need,” the representative reportedly said.

The attack on the medical camp is not the first attempt by the security forces to take control of the camp. Residents and refugees interviewed by Dawn in the days leading up to the operation reveal that they have been afraid of visiting the camp to receive medical aid for fears of assaults by the security forces.

According to BNM and BSO-Azad relief coordinators at Mashky and at a nearby medical aid camp in Nokju, the paramilitary Frontier Corps (FC) blocked aid trucks from entering earthquake-hit areas for several days. Travelling through the earthquake-affected area it is possible to see lines of trucks stranded at seven out of the total 12 FC checkposts along the road. Shehak Baloch, a BNM coordinator at Nokju said that relief trucks had been stopped at Jebri, Nokju Rindak, Laki, Mangoli, and the Mashky-Gajjar and Awaran FC camps. Visits by Dawn to a handful of FC points in the area in the days leading up to the operation confirm that the security forces had been blocking aid from reaching Awaran district. Piles of tents and lines of trucks were stopped from reaching medical camps and victims of the earthquake.

At the Mashky medial camp, the army representative urged residents to give up names of local “terrorists”, or “members of the Balochistan Liberation Army (BLA)”, according to the eyewitness. The BLA is one of a handful of separatist militant groups operating in the province and fighting the Pakistani security forces for an independent Balochistan, though the dominant group active in the Mashky-Gajjar area is the Balochistan Liberation Front (BLF) headed by doctor-turned-militant leader, Dr Allah Nazar.

Residents have told Dawn that they have felt pressured to give information on local guerilla fighters by FC soldiers in the past, and that they fear reprisal attacks from militant groups. “The security forces put us in a very dangerous situation when they try to force this information out of us,” said a local schoolteacher, who asked to remain unnamed.

Before the men were released they were given aid packages by the army to take home, according to eyewitnesses interviewed by Dawn. Every affected person that Dawn spoke to in the course of 4-5 days said that they did not want to receive aid from the army. Some cited kidnappings, torture and daily harassment. Others said that they were against the army on principle, and wanted a “Free Balochistan”. And yet others said that they were afraid of being punished by the BLF for taking aid from the security forces.

While the 500 men were in the camp, fire was reportedly exchanged between the security forces and the BLF, as the latter tried to regain control of the camp, according to the eyewitness. Bullets flew through the air at the camp, forcing soldiers and the men they had rounded up to lie down on the floor.

This correspondent left the scene at 5.30pm on the first day of the operation, though reports from contacts in the area confirm that the helicopters, shooting, and shelling continued all day on Tuesday.

The security forces launched a major operation in Mashky at the end of December last year, in Mai village close to Nokju. After the operation, the FC reportedly set up 12 new checkpoints that surrounded the Mashky-Gajjar area.

State blocks neutral international aid distributors Dr Abdul Malik, the Chief Minister of Balochistan, has been calling for the intervention of international aid organisations since the earthquake hit Balochistan. Awaran district, the epicentre of the earthquake, is a known stronghold for Baloch separatists, and the security troops have long been an unpopular presence in the area. The area’s main separatist groups, including BNM, BSO-Azad and the BLF, have also been calling for the entrance of neutral international aid distributors.

Both Dr Malik, and the leaders of the BNM and BLF, Dr Abdul Manan and Dr Allah Nazar, have called for the intervention from international organisations like Medecins sans Frontieres/Doctors Without Borders (MSF), the International Committee of the Red Cross/Red Crescent (ICRC) and United Nations (UN) humanitarian organisations. However, Pakistan’s National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) has rejected requests by MSF to enter the country, arguing that Pakistan has the situation under control. UN organisations that specialise in shelter, health, nutrition and sanitation in post-disaster situations, as well as in providing crucial coordination services to local and international relief workers have likewise been refused entry. A team of UN workers were turned back from Karachi last week. The provincial government is currently in overdraft and the federal government is in deficit, prompting experts to question how the authorities plan to bring relief to earthquake-hit victims in Awaran district.

[Agnostic Muslim]

Some more details on the acts of Baloch terrorists

The actions of terrorists causing an exacerbation of the suffering of the Baloch people (due to the recent earthquake) through terrorist attacks on Pakistani military relief operations is not an isolated or new phenomenon. The following article (and an earlier one posted by Farhan) clearly highlight the fact that the separatists are deliberately choosing to attack non-military targets.
============
Wrong policies of militant outfits isolates Baloch struggle for rights
Posted on 2013-10-19 04:43:23

Ahmar Mustikhan

The assassins fired a volley of bullets as the chaddar-clad woman got down from a rickshaw on April 27, 2010 in Quetta and left. The woman was left lying dying in a pool of blood. She was Professor Nazima Talib, a much loved teacher to countless grateful students across Balochistan.

The so-called Baloch Liberation Army (BLA) claimed the killing. The London-based chief of the B.L.A., Hyrbyair Marri, defend the killing of Professor NazimaTalib as reaction to the killing of a Baloch woman who died during a military raid on her home.

It was clear that Hybyair Marri had thrown the age-old Baloch honor code, called Dod-o-Rabeedag to the winds. Women, like old men and children, are considered to be the bahote or wards of the Baloch and are not allowed to be touched during war.

This was the most cowardly action carried out by the Baloch in hundreds of years of their martial history that included challenging the Portuguese, the British and Pakistan military excesses for more than six decades.

Hyrbyair Marri was clearly not on the right path. He had become judge, jury and executioner - and no questions have been allowed.

On September 15, 2011 another killing took place in Kosh Kalat in Kech District. The victim, Mohammad Hussain, was executed in Taliban-style fired upon multiple times. "Nothing was left of Hussain's face," his U.S.-based relatives told The Frontier Post.

The assassins also took away the dead man's cell phone and cash around rupees 5,000 from his pocket, relatives told. Question is, are these murderers freedom fighters or criminals?

The main militant ideologue Hafeez Hassanabadi -uncle to former senator Sanaullah Baloch-is a weird person. In emails and conversations with the Frontier Post, they made no bones they do they actually believed in killing as a freedom fighting strategy. They want to kill all members of the moderate National Party (NP) as well as the entire Mengal family leading the Balochistan Nationalist Party (BNP) party. The charge against them sentences to death for being collaborators with Pakistan. Two Mengals, Sardar Akhtar Jan and his father Sardar Ataullah were both chief ministers of Balochistan. Also, BNP has a respectable following among Baloch voters.

This Tamil Tiger strategy has made insurgents total political outcasts in Balochistan. There was at least a façade of unity at the time of the killing of former Balochistan governor and Chief Minister Nawab Akbar Khan Bugti in fall 2006. However, it is time to put that killing into perspective. "My grandfather never advocated independence," Shahzain Bugti, who is a leader of the Jamhoori Watan Party, told this writer in a recent interview.

It is true that the Nawab Bugti may have talked about freedom in one or two of his last interviews, merely out of frustration with the military government of Musharraf. But the fact is his main grudge was the building of a military school for which the military government purchased 300 acres from the rival Kalpar faction of his tribe.

Fast forward, after the killing of Nawab Bugti.

A year later, the second-in-command in the militant movement Nawabzada Balach Marri died. The Marri family says he was killed in a Pakistani attack, others report that the NATO mistook him for the Taliban and hit his convoy, while some Indian and Pakistan intelligence sources insist he died of a massive heart stroke.

"The movement became totally rudderless after the deaths of Nawab Bugti and Balach Marri," says Jan Buedi, spokesperson for the Balochistan CM Dr. Malik Baloch.

During the lifetime of Nawab Bugti people from other ethnic groups were never hared in Balochistan. But following his death people from extremely poor backgrounds who were non-Baloch were targeted by the militants.

"The militants have killed 2,000 unarmed civilians. Punjabis, Pashtuns, Seraikis, Sindhis. The victims include 400 Baloch," quips Senator Hasil Bizenjo, senior vice president of the National Party.

Bizenjo's gripe appears justified. His party lost at least six leading members and a number of supporters to militant bullets and he himself routinely receives death threats from the Baloch Liberation Front led by Dr. Allah Nazar Baloch. The B.L.A., B.L.F., along with the Baloch Republican Party of Switzerland-based Brahumdagh Bugti stands politically orphaned in Balochistan and without political allies in Pakistan because of their wrong politics.

This was not the case in the previous Baloch movements. For instance, during the 1973-77 uprising in Balochistan, the Baloch movement spearheaded by the National Awami Party enjoyed widespread political support all over Pakistan.

Today the Baloch appear to be trapped between a rock and a hard place. "We are facing arrogance from both sides, the military and the militants," says Senator Bizenjo, who is calling for a second chance to Baloch youths involved in militant violence and end to the kill-and-dump policy.

While the actions of the Frontier Corps and Pakistan's secret services, especially their alleged tendency towards "enforced disappearances" and "kill-and-dump" approaches to anti-terrorism, have been hard to defend since many years now. Now Baloch militant outfits have also adopted similar brutal tactics and have become judge, jury and the executioner for innocent civilians. One fails to understand how it advances the national cause of the downtrodden in Balochistan.

For the militant the question of political and civil liberties is a non-issue. "In the U.S. after 9/11 did you not see all civil liberties being curtailed," is London-based Hyrbyair Marri's favorite quote.

Hyrbyair Marri makes no secret he does not have much regard for democracy. In repeated conversations with this writer, he insisted that a small group of dedicated fighters was far more useful for advancement of his separatist goal than a mammoth crowd, chanting slogans.

One of the most ominous aspects of hard-line militancy in Balochistan is that most of the victims, including the Baloch, are accused of being government spies and informers and then killed by the militant outfits. "The situation is so bad that brothers and first cousins are at each other's throat," says Abdul Haleem Tareen, a Pashtun notable who now lives in London. He fears the vicious cycle of blood vendetta may continue for years.

Political elements have been completely shunted out by the militants in Balochistan. Former speaker of the Balochistan provincial assembly, Mir Akram Dashti, says that the NP, which now leads the ruling coalition in Balochistan, had always tried to join the protest against enforced disappearances and extra judicial killings. "We were told to stay away as the militants said we try to cash on the situation for election purposes," Dashti said on the phone.

Hyrbyair Marri understands the consequences of his politics. "In this field even your shadow leaves you," Hyrbyair Marri said a while ago. Let alone other politicians, Mr. Marri has not been talking to his younger brother Mehran Baluch and calls him a "thief." According to Baloch sources in Europe, the two brothers are at odds over foreign finances to the Baloch movement.

Hyrbyair Marri's favorite slogan is "Neither brother, nor friend just the cause," while a handful of his paid supporters have accused his father and senior nationalist leader Nawab Khair Bakhsh Marri of "nepotism' for allegedly closing his eyes to what they call the shenanigans of his youngest and most loved son, Mehran Baluch.

During meetings with this writer in London last month, Balochistan chief minister Dr. Malik Baloch, who was once himself an ideologue of the liberation movement from the platform of the now disbanded Balochistan Liberation Movement, said, "The debate at hand is whether the Baloch movement as it stands today is a progressive movement or a reactionary movement."

Dr. Malik Baloch wants an end to the conflict and is holding an olive branch to the militants. He has also promised that a high-level tribal delegation would visit Europe to talk with the Baloch leaders in exile.

Dr. Malik Baloch himself has survived three attacks on his life since April - two carried out by the B.R.A., during the election campaign, and one by the B.L.F. while he was visiting quake-hit Awaran last month.

The Chief Minister is now advocating an Irish solution to end the conflict in Balochistan. Talking to The Frontier Post, he said, "We must ask ourselves what he got and what we lost during the last 12 years of strife"
Wrong policies of militant outfits isolates Baloch struggle for rights

[Oracle]

Do you even know the meaning of the word 'Genocide'? Here, i will help you out.

"the policy of deliberately killing a nationality or ethnic group"

Genocide | Define Genocide at Dictionary.com

Yep, I do know. Thank you for the not needed help.

[Agnostic Muslim]

Yep, I do know. Thank you for the not needed help.

In that case, you should now understand why the term 'genocide' is not applicable here.

[Agnostic Muslim]

No military operation: Army in Awaran for relief efforts only, says ISPR

RAWALPINDI: The security forces are present in Awaran and Mashkay districts of Balochistan for the purpose of providing relief to earthquake victims, said Director-General Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR) Major General Asim Saleem Bajwa on Sunday.

Dispelling media reports of an army operation in Balochistan, the DG ISPR said that security forces are committed to the relief operation despite repeated attacks by miscreants on troops.

“The security forces have exercised utmost restraint, despite losing six soldiers to IED attacks and fire raids, and having another 12 soldiers injured,” General Bajwa said, reiterating that there was no military operation taking place in the two districts.

The military has claimed that its forces busy in relief operations and providing aid to earthquake victims near militant strongholds have come under frequent attacks.

Background

The first earthquake had hit Balochistan on September 24, killing at least 350 people and injuring hundreds more.

Another 7.2-magnitude quake furthered the damage when it struck the area on September 28.

A senior FC officer had said that most of the stricken places in Awaran are highly risky areas for relief workers and provincial functionaries as it is a hub of Baloch nationalist militants.
Mashkay – a sub-district of Awaran – has been under the militant command of nationalist guerrilla commander, Dr Allah Nazar who has been confronting the FC and Pakistan Army for a long time.

No military operation: Army in Awaran for relief efforts only, says ISPR – The Express Tribune

The earlier article posted by 1980s that suggested a 'military operation' in Mashkay did so through some rather painful contortions trying to depict the military's 'defensive' measures against terrorists in a terrorist stronghold (to ensure the security of personnel and local civilians and the seamless distribution of aid).

[1980s]

The earlier article posted by 1980s that suggested a 'military operation' in Mashkay

"Suggested". LOL

Crap effort on your part to put a spin on Mahvish Ahmad's first hand account of what he saw and experienced there.

Its more than a 'suggestion'.

It is the eye witness testimony of the DAWN correspondent, who was there, and an account drawn from his interviews with local civilians in the area.

"Suggested".

OTHO, nobody cares what you or those cheap, two-faced toothless rodents at Rawalpindi HQ think.

Cheers,

[Oracle]

In that case, you should now understand why the term 'genocide' is not applicable here.

It's applicable all the while Pakistan ruled states. I have left you, your bit of reasoning in the Nixon thread.

[Agnostic Muslim]

"Suggested". LOL

Crap effort on your part to put a spin on Mahvish Ahmad's first hand account of what he saw and experienced there.

Its more than a 'suggestion'.

It is the eye witness testimony of the DAWN correspondent, who was there, and an account drawn from his interviews with local civilians in the area.

"Suggested".

Perhaps you should read the article you posted again to understand the context - this excerpt for example:

"as the army troops entered the town centre to take control where the Balochistan Liberation Front (BLF), a banned separatist militant group, had been quite active"

What exactly would you expect the military to do when they arrive in a town that is (according to the correspondent herself) a terrorist stronghold? Put garlands around the necks of the BLF terrorists? The Army entered the town and took control of terrorist operated camps and centers and started distributing relief goods. Given that the terrorists have launched multiple unprovoked attacks on military led relief convoys, no rational individual would fault the army for driving out the terrorists from the town prior to initiating relief operations in said town.

Do you have a problem with the Pakistani Army killing terrorists and taking control of their camps and centers and distributing relief goods to those affected by the earthquake?

[Agnostic Muslim]

It's applicable all the while Pakistan ruled states.

It is only applicable when the definition of genocide is met (which it is not either in Balochistan or East Pakistan) - it is not 'applicable' just because you feel like applying it.

I have left you, your bit of reasoning in the Nixon thread.

And I will address that post in due time.

[Agnostic Muslim]

More chaos and carnage at the hands of those that the likes of Talpur, Tarek Fateh etc. support:

Jaffar Express struck by explosion; seven killed
SYED ALI SHAH
[ATTACH=CONFIG]34163[/ATTACH]
2013-10-21 13:20:29

DERA MURAD JAMALI: At least seven persons were killed and 16 injured when a passenger train was struck by a bomb explosion in Balochistan's Naseerabad district on Monday, police said.

Asad Gilani, the Home Secretary Balochistan told Dawn.com militants targeted Jaffar Express using improvised explosive devices (IEDs) in Notal area of Naseerabad district.

"When the train reached Notal, there were huge explosions", Gilani said.

He said the blasts damaged a portion of the railway track and three bogies of train.

The train was carrying hundreds of passengers from Punjab province who were returning to Balochistan after Eid holidays.

The Home Secretary said the seven people, including two women, who were killed in the incident were all passengers. He added that the condition of six injured was reported as serious.

Riaz Ahmed, Quetta's Superintendent of Police (Railways) said the bomb was planted on the track which went off when the train reached Notal, adding that three brothers were also among the dead.

He further said that Divisional Superintendent Railway and other officials were en route to the blast site in order to file a report over the incident.

Zafar Shah Bukhari, a senior official in the area, also confirmed the bomb attack and death toll.

Bukhari said the Jaffar Express was travelling from Rawalpindi to Quetta, the main town of Baluchistan province when the explosion occurred, derailing several bogies.

“We have taken the dead bodies and injured to the nearby hospital,” Bukhari said, adding that the condition of six of the injured was critical.

Chief Minister Balochistan Dr Malik Baloch strongly condemned the attack at and termed it a terrorist act while ordering the local administration to submit a report over the incident.

The chief minister also instructed the Balochistan government to provide medical treatment to all injured.

The incident led to the suspension of railway traffic between Balochistan and other parts of Pakistan.

The train service was expected to resume after repair of the damaged track and security clearance, a railway official told Dawn.com on the condition of anonymity.

There has been no claim of responsibility for the attack.

However, senior police officials suspected that Baloch rebels were responsible for the attack.

The banned Baloch Republican Army is active in the area and have been targeting vital national installations including gas pipelines and power pylons and security forces in the area for more than a decade.

Jaffar Express struck by explosion; seven killed - DAWN.COM

The BLA terrorists carried out an attack this August on the same train, and claimed responsibility:

Three killed as Jaffar Express attacked in Bolan 31 injured in attack
QUETTA: The Rawalpindi-bound Jaffar Express came under rocket and gun attack on Friday in the Dozan area of Bolan district, claiming the lives of three passengers. Thirty-one others, including women and children, sustained injuries.

Soon after the incident, the FC and other law enforcement agencies launched a search operation in the area. The FC spokesman said during the exchange of firing with armed men, eight terrorists, who were involved in the train attack, were killed.

Officials of the district administration said that the Jaffar Express was heading to Rawalpindi from Quetta when it was attacked by unidentified armed men in the Dozan area, 40 kilometres from the provincial capital.

“The passenger train came under attack when it was passing through the mountainous region in the Dozan area of Bolan district,” said Tehsildar Machh Zubair Kurd while talking to The News.

Reports suggested that some armed men had taken positions near the railway track in the mountainous region of Bolan and as the Jaffar Express approached the site at around 10:30am, they attacked it with automatic guns and rockets.

The Frontier Corps (FC) and police personnel, who were posted in the train for protection, retaliated. The firing between the security personnel and armed men continued for more than 20 minutes. Later, the attackers fled from the scene.

“I heard an ear-splitting boom of the rocket when it hit the engine. I saw blood-stained injured people lying all around,” an eyewitness told The News. The firing claimed the lives of three passengers and injured 31 others.

Officials of the Bolan administration and Levies force reached the spot and shifted the injured to Quetta’s hospitals where an emergency was declared.

Minutes after the firing, a powerful bomb exploded at the railways track two kilometres away from the site of the attack. The track was partially damaged and the train service suspended in Balochistan for two hours. However, it resumed after completion of the necessary repair work.

Balochistan Chief Minister Dr Abdul Malik Baloch condemned the attack on Jaffar Express and expressed grief over the loss of lives in the attack. He directed the administration to provide the best health facilities to the injured. A spokesman for the Baloch Liberation Army (BLA) telephoned media offices and claimed responsibility for the train attack.

Three killed as Jaffar Express attacked in Bolan 31 injured in attack - thenews.com.pk