Pakistan’s Balochistan is witnessing a tide of violence as the Balochistan Liberation Army (BLA) continues to carry out terrorist attacks in the province, with recent attacks on security posts in Pakistan that resulted in the death of seven Pakistani soldiers and 13 terrorists.
Forty-one soldiers and civilians died in January 2022 and the toll could cross 50 and more.
Umer Farooq writing for Pakistan’s weekly, Friday Times said that Pakistan is back to the situation where it has to face two insurgencies one in the North West led by the Tehrik-e Taliban Pakistan (TTP) also known as Pakistani Taliban and the other in South led by Balochistan Liberation Army (BLA), reported Al Arabiya.
“The fact that Taliban have now become a state doesn’t necessarily mean that they have completely transitioned out of their former status as a terror and militant organisation.”, he said, reported the news channel.
Notably, following the BLA attacks, Pakistan’s Interior Ministry on Thursday issued a threat alert in the wake of recent terrorist attacks in the Panjgur and Naushki districts of Balochistan.
Umer Farooq also draws attention towards the Afghan Taliban’s “linkages with Al-Qaida,on the one hand and Pakistani Taliban on the other” and their ‘rivalry’ with the localchapter of the Islamic State (IS) that is called ISIS (Khorasan).
Furthermore, he said that the Pakistani Taliban have regrouped and revived their strengthin the Pak-Afghan border, areas and their leadership is based in Afghan cities and townsclose to the border.
