The hijacking of a train marks a watershed in the Balochistan insurgency
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jon.wallace
21 March 2025
Yet Pakistan’s government shows little signs of engaging with the political solution required to end the conflict.
Baloch separatists hijacked a passenger train carrying more than 400 people travelling from Quetta to Peshawar on 11 March. The event sent shock waves across Pakistan and was strongly condemned by the United Nations as a ‘heinous terrorist act’. Responsibility for the attack was claimed by the militant Baloch Liberation Army (BLA), which is designated as a terrorist group by the United States and the European Union. The subsequent siege, near the Bolan Pass in a remote part of Pakistan’s southwestern province of Balochistan ended – apparently without mass casualties – after a 36-hour stand-off between the hijackers and army special forces. But some lives were lost. According to Pakistani military sources, at least 31 people, including civilians and security personnel, as well as 33 militants, were killed in the action. However, the BLA has disputed these figures claiming that it took 214 hostages and killed them all.There are also conflicting reports about the army’s precise role in securing the release of the hostages, with evidence that the BLA had allowed women, children and the elderly to leave the train for prior to the fighting. A new kind of attackThe hijacking of a passenger train in Pakistan is almost unprecedented. Most attacks by Baloch militants, including the BLA, have tended to target buses and other forms of road transport in the region.
It was no coincidence that the hijacked train, the Jaffar Express, is thought to have had at least 100 troops on board at the time of the attack.
Roads are used by security personnel and non-Baloch civilians, mainly from Punjab, working on projects tied to the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC). The CPEC is opposed by Baloch separatist groups, and a source of deep local resentment. An attack on a bus in Balochistan’s Noshki district just days after the hijacking, which killed five soldiers and wounded dozens more, indicates that such assaults remain an integral part of militant strategy.Nevertheless, there have been signs of a shift in militant tactics. Last November the BLA claimed responsibility for a suicide bombing, which killed at least 25 people at Quetta railway station as trains prepared to depart. Earlier in August, the BLA said it was behind a series of bomb blasts that destroyed key infrastructure, including a railway line connecting Balochistan to the rest of the country. That attack forced the suspension of all rail services until October.
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But with the insurgency making road transport in Balochistan increasingly precarious, rail travel was judged by many to be safer, especially for troop movements. The BLA clearly intended to exploit that assumption and expose it as fatally flawed. It was no coincidence that the hijacked train, the Jaffar Express, is thought to have had at least 100 troops on board at the time of the attack. The BLA’s daring and meticulously planned hijacking marks a watershed in the development of Baloch separatism. The region’s insurgency is fuelled by state-led policies geared to maximize the extraction of Balochistan’s rich natural resources (gas and minerals) with little or no benefit to its local population. Violence has grown in proportion to the seeming disregard of Baloch grievances over the lack of distributive justice, the absence of accountability and bogus representation.Indeed, separatist violence has risen sharply since the 2024 general elections, which were denounced as illegitimate by Baloch nationalist leaders who claimed that votes had been cast by ‘supernatural entities’. The BLA’s expanding supportThe insurgency is now squarely under the control of the BLA. What is more, its formidable operational capacity appears to have been recognized by its deadliest foe – the Pakistan military – as a game changer.At a press conference following the hijacking on 14 March, an army spokesman vowed ‘to take on the terrorists’ (although he did not identify the BLA), and acknowledged that the attack had ‘changed the rules of the game.’
The group has widened support to a nascent Baloch middle class concentrated along the Makran coast, and less advantaged communities in central and eastern districts.
His observations come amid reports of the BLA’s consolidation as a fighting force of some consequence. The BLA appears to have mastery of advanced technology for surveillance and intelligence-gathering operations and is skilled in the use of sophisticated weaponry. Meanwhile the group has widened support to a nascent Baloch middle class concentrated along the Makran coast, and less advantaged communities in central and eastern districts around Kohlu and Sibi, hitherto under the influence of tribal chiefs. Most exceptionally, the BLA appeals to otherwise conservative Baloch women, many of whom have joined its ranks as suicide bombers (although their numbers are still dwarfed by Baloch women drawn to non-violent campaigns). The blame gamePakistan’s military and its allies in government were shy to name the hijackers and vague about the new ‘rules’ in play. But they were notably forthright about identifying India and Afghanistan as the ‘enablers and facilitators’ of terrorist activity in Balochistan.
No less concerning for Pakistan is pressure from China to protect its workforce and hefty investments in Balochistan.
Although no conclusive proof was offered to support these allegations, India was accused of acting as the ‘main sponsor’ of the hijackers, while Afghanistan was charged with supplying them with advanced weaponry left behind by US forces after their withdrawal from Afghanistan in 2021.
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