Another Master-Stroke For Ensuring A Peaceful Balochistan

Amna Awan
For the Pakistani state, Baluchistan is both a strategic asset and an inseparable piece of the puzzle that makes up the country. The province is Pakistan’s largest; it forms 45 percent of the country’s territory, and borders Iran and Afghanistan. It has the country’s longest coastline and largest natural gas reserves, and contains a vast array of resources such as coal, oil, copper, gold, lead and zinc. Other countries have not only kept a close eye on Baluchistan, but have, at various points, been involved in its internal affairs. The nature of that involvement has varied from support for the separatist rebellion (Afghanistan, India); the deployment of fighter jets and gunships to squash the rebellion (Iran); the construction and operation of a lucrative deepwater port (China); the hunting of the province’s fowl (Saudi Arabia); an old lease on parts of its territory (Oman); the requisition of its long and winding roads to transport goods to troops in Afghanistan (the United States); and billion-dollar investments to mine its mineral-rich earth (anyone who can get their hands on a contract). Owing to the strategic importance of the province, the South Asian region has been under renewed spotlight after Pakistan and China announced plans to build a multi-billion dollar economic corridor, linking Gawadar Port in Baluchistan to the city of Kashgar in the western Chinese province of Xinjiang. Balochistan is a region where enforced disappearances and extra-judicial killing are common. Baloch activists are frequently the target of what they call “kill and dump” policy with bodies found that are often badly mutilated and showing signs of torture. Over the years, the army and its subsidiary security force, the Frontier Corps, has successfully captured and killed hundreds of RAW backed separatists. While FC personnel are facing constant threat from Taliban militants, they are also fighting Baloch separatists who are considered as anti-state and a threat to the CPEC. The recent killing of a former physician Dr Mannan in a remote corner of southwestern Pakistan’s Balochistan Province is another success story of ongoing military operation. Mannan Baloch was a central figure in efforts to reorganize fragmented separatist factions engaged in a simmering nationalist insurgency. Dr Mannan was serving as BNM’s Secretary General, the second highest rank in the party, which claims to be a peaceful movement seeking independence from Pakistan and was killed in military raid in a house in Balochistan’s Mustang area on January 30 along with four other companions. Being employed in Balochistan health department he was not only an intrepid political mobilizer whose party could successfully hold shutter down strikes in Khuzdar to propagate the separatist theme but was also very instrumental in influencing the educated youth taking refuge of humanitarian aspects in fueling the insurgent agenda. Mannan and four other men were reportedly involved in subversive activities, including attacks on law enforcement agencies. Weapons and ammunition were said to have been seized at a property where the men were killed. Apart from arms and ammunition, the paramilitary troops also recovered communication equipment and anti-Pakistan literature from the insurgents’ hideout. The slain insurgents had masterminded the May 2015 execution-style of 23 passengers of a Punjab-bound bus in Mustang district. The victims were all laborers and belonged to different districts of Punjab. The media reports revealed that the security forces had conducted 239 intelligence-based operations in Baluchistan over the past three months in which 22 militants were killed and 14 others injured. According to the sources, the Inspector General of Police Baluchistan, Ahsan Mahboob said that security forces had conducted a search operation in the Killi Datu area of Mustang during which an exchange of fire took place between the security personnel and militants in which Mannan and four others were killed. His death will be a severe blow to the insurgents. The credible sources have revealed that Abdul Mannan’s group smuggled weapons and fighters across the border from Pakistan. Similarly, Dr Baloch was proclaimed offender in many police cases with head money of 7 million rupees. He was a militant commander who was wearing arms in certain videos and photographs which clearly depicts the real face of Mannan and his clandestine actions against the sovereignty of Pakistan. In many videos and interviews he had confessed that he was the mastermind of several attacks including killing of pro Government civilians and policemen. In videos he was carrying RPG-grenade launcher, AK-47 assault rifles, 9MM pestles, satellite phones and other ammunition. Hence it would be right to say that the Political side of Mannan was not his cause of fame but these militant activities. It is worth mentioning that during earthquake of September 2013 Mannan was actively involved in targeting the law enforcement agencies operation for relief activities in Awaran District. Mannan who had served as a medical officer in several areas, including Jahoo, Awaran, Greshag and Mashkay. In 2011, he resigned as a medical officer, refusing to be a Pakistan government employee had reportedly been financed, assisted and propagated as a helping hand in connection with IDPs of military operations by an INGO Action Aid Pakistan. Being employee of health department he shared sensitive information regarding the IDPs to the NGO especially on the medical needs of women and children of the conflict to be proliferated for vested designs. Mannan remained part of the medical practitioners involved in the illegal sale of human organs and exploited the IDPs in the camps where Doctors had taken their kidneys out. The children of IDPs were terrorized not to divulge more details. Moreover, he was the staunch critic of CPEC. Foreign backed militant was propagating that ethnic Baloch people view the project as a colonizing endeavor by the military and the Chinese to usurp the Baloch land and resources. His efforts were directed to create a perception that the Baloch leaders who oppose these construction projects in Baluchistan because of the fear that the Baloch will not be the primary recipient of the investment. The Baloch , who make only 5% of Pakistan’s total population, will be converted into a minority on their own land with the influx of ‘outsiders’ on the port city. He launched certain sinister activities in the province were parts of attempts to sabotage the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) project hence undermining the image of Pakistan army, and he also turned innocent baloch against economic corridor. Hence the menace has therefore been removed in a successful by our security forces which mark a marvelous move in bringing peace in a volatile Baluchistan.
India does not want CPEC to materialize hence she is using these dirty tactics to create chaotic situation in the province. However the fact is that this project will have the potential to transform Pakistan into an important country of the region. India is covertly taking sinister activities in order to make the project controversial. For this she is giving money to a small fraction of Baloch insurgents who are projecting negative impacts of CPEC and etc. therefore to make the project successful, a peaceful Baluchistan is inevitable for which our armed forces are striving hard in the form of operation Zarb-e-Azb.