Pakistan has been put on high alert following attacks by armed assailants on two security camps in the restive south-western Balochistan province that resulted in the deaths of seven soldiers and 13 insurgents. The attacks, claimed later by the banned Baloch Liberation Army (BLA), took place in Panjgur and Noshki districts on February 2.
Sources told News18 that fearing more such attacks, Pakistan’s Interior Ministry has put the country on high alert.
The BLA, meanwhile, has reportedly claimed that its “operation” in Noshki is over. It claimed that nine members of its Majeed Brigade killed “at least 100” Pakistani security forces personnel in the district. It added that its attack in Panjgur was ongoing after 30 hours.
A statement by the Pakistan Army, however, said that attacks on both posts were “successfully repulsed” and the forces carried out a clearance operation to “hunt down the terrorists hiding in the area”.
The attacks came hours before Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan arrived in Beijing for the opening of the Winter Olympics, where he will have meetings with Chinese President Xi Jinping and other leaders. Balochistan, the largest province of Pakistan in terms of landmass, is home to the multi-billion-dollar China-Pakistan Economic Corridor project.
“Our armed forces repulsed the big attacks,” Imran Khan and Minister of Interior Sheikh Rasheed Ahmad had said in separate statements.
Ethnic Baloch guerrillas have been fighting the government for decades for a separate state, saying the central government unfairly exploits Balochistan’s rich gas and mineral resources.
The BLA, a separatist outfit, has recently stepped up attacks on security forces and installations in Pakistan. The attacks on Wednesday were the latest in a string of such assaults in Balochistan and come a week after 10 soldiers were killed in a terrorist attack on a security forces’ checkpost in the province’s Kech district.
Three Levies Force personnel and a Bugti tribal leader were killed and eight others injured on January 28 in bomb blasts in the Sui area of Dera Bugti. On January 30, at least 17 people, including two policemen, were injured in a grenade attack in Dera Allahyar town of Jaffarabad district.
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