Curbing violence: Karachi-style operation planned for Balochistan

Move to be announced at a high-level meeting in Quetta next week

ISLAMABAD:

A day after gunmen methodically slaughtered 20 men after plucking them from Karachi-bound passenger buses in Mastung district, The Express Tribune has learnt that the federal government might launch a Karachi-style surgical operation in Balochistan.

The go-ahead for the operation is likely to be given in a high-level meeting Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif has convened next week to discuss the law order situation in the troubled province.

The meeting was convened after Premier Nawaz spoke to Balochistan Chief Minister Dr Abdul Malik Baloch, the military leadership and other stakeholders in the province.

“Unabated targeted killings motivated by ethnic or sectarian hatred has forced the civil and military leadership to order a Karachi-like operation in Balochistan,” a source told The Express Tribune.

Officially, the Prime Minister House confirmed that a meeting on the law and order situation in Balochistan has been convened. Chief Minister Baloch told journalists in Quetta that he and Premier Nawaz agreed to convene a multi-party conference to discuss the latest wave of violence in the province and a way out.

Conversely, highly credible sources said the government thinks there is no need for convening another all-party conference. And instead Premier Nawaz and army chief General Raheel Sharif will preside over a high-level meeting where important decisions are likely to be taken.



Sources, however, said the meeting might announce the launch of a Karachi-style targeted operation in the province wrecked by ethnic, sectarian and Taliban violence. “It will be intelligence-led operation,” another source told The Express Tribune. “The paramilitary Frontier Corps will lead the operation, while the Pakistan Army will be on standby,” he added.  Like Karachi, the Balochistan operation will be targeted at organised crimes, sectarian militants, hostile foreign agencies, Taliban insurgents, smugglers, weapons runners and proscribed outfits operating near the border with Iran, Jundullah in particular, according to sources. The objective of the operation will be to dismantle the network of militants and criminals.

The intelligence network in Balochistan will be expanded and strengthened. Government and security officials have long accused foreign spy agencies, India’s Research and Analysis Wing (RAW) in particular for fuelling unrest in Balochistan as part of its bigger game plan to sabotage the Gwadar deep seaport project which has been dubbed ‘game-changer’ for the region.

Sources said that RAW’s strategy in Karachi and Balochistan is the same: to target peaceful communities to whip up fear and panic and destabilise Pakistan. “In Balochistan, the Pashtoon-dominated areas are by and large peaceful, while the regions where the Baloch are in majority are volatile,” a third source said. “Perhaps this is why Baloch insurgents, on the instigation of RAW, targeted the Pashtoons in a bid to pit the two communities against each other,” the source added, referring to Friday’s deadly attack in the Khad Kocha area of Mastung district.

Mureed Baloch, a spokesperson for a shady insurgent group United Baloch Army, claimed responsibility for the slaying of Pashtoons in Mastung, saying that it was in retaliation for the ongoing military operations in Kalat and Mastung districts.

Sources said that Premier Nawaz will take all political stakeholders in Balochistan into confidence before announcing the launch of the surgical operation. Two key parties in the province – Pashtoonkhwa Milli Awami Party of Mehmood Khan Achakzai and the National Party of Dr Baloch – are coalition partners of the PML-N both at the Centre as well as in Balochistan.

Sources also said that Dr Baloch, as well as other stakeholders, have already offered full support for the intelligence-based operation in Balochistan. However, the launch of the operation will be announced at the high-level meeting in Quetta.


Published in The Express Tribune, May 31^st, 2015.