Islamabad: More than 120 persons were killed in Pakistan’s Balochistan province following multiple suicide and gun attacks by militants, officials said, according to a report by The Guardian.
According to the report, 33 persons, including civilians, were killed in multiple suicide and gun attacks by “terrorists” across the restive south-western province of Balochistan, while Pakistan’s military gunned down 92 “terrorists” while responding to the violence.
Baloch insurgents targeted civilians, a high-security prison, police stations and paramilitary installations during the attacks. Eighteen civilians, 15 security personnel and 92 insurgents were killed, the military said.
Analysts described it as the deadliest single day for militants in decades.
Baloch separatists and the Pakistani Taliban frequently target security forces in Balochistan and elsewhere in the country, coordinated attacks on this scale are rare. Authorities said at least 133 militants have been killed across Balochistan over the past 48 hours, including 92 on Saturday.
The military and Pakistan’s interior minister Mohsin Naqvi said the attackers had the backing of India.
There was no immediate response from New Delhi, which has denied such allegations previously. The outlawed Baloch Liberation Army, or BLA, claimed responsibility for the suicide and gun attacks, during which some of the banks were robbed and a police station and dozens of vehicles torched.
The BLA released videos showing female fighters taking part in the attacks.
Shahid Rind, a spokesperson for the Balochistan government, said most of the attacks were foiled. They came a day after the military said security forces this week raided two militant hideouts in the country’s south-west, killing 41 insurgents in separate gun battles.
Earlier on Saturday, authorities said that insurgents destroyed rail tracks, prompting Pakistan Railways to suspend train services from Balochistan to other parts of the country. Targets were police, prison, paramilitary forces and passengers.
The attacks began almost simultaneously across the province, the provincial health minister, Bakht Muhammad Kakar, said. He said two police officers were killed in a grenade attack on a police vehicle in Quetta, the provincial capital. The government declared an emergency at all hospitals.
Dozens of insurgents also attacked a prison in Mastung district, freeing more than 30 inmates, police said. In other attacks, militants attempted to storm the provincial headquarters of paramilitary forces in Nushki district, but the attack was repelled, police said.
The BLA is banned in Pakistan and designated a terrorist organisation by the US. It has been behind numerous attacks in recent years, and Pakistan says the group enjoys the backing from India, a charge New Delhi denies.
Pakistan has repeatedly said that Baloch separatists, the Pakistani Taliban and other militants are using Afghan soil to launch attacks inside Pakistan. Kabul denies the claim.
Baloch separatist groups and the Pakistani Taliban, known as Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan, or TTP, have intensified attacks in Pakistan in recent months. The TTP is a separate group but allied with Afghanistan’s Taliban, who returned to power in August 2021.
Balochistan has long been the site of an insurgency by separatist groups seeking independence from Pakistan’s central government in Islamabad.
