Balochistan Liberation Army stepping up its operations

Many separatist movements emerged around the world throughout history.

These movements usually demand the independence of territories in their mother states.

Some of them adopt peaceful means, while others adopt violent ones to express their positions and even impose them.

These positions often rebel against the policies of central authorities.

Some of the movements that appeared in the past years used arms and established their own militias.

This is exactly the case in Balochistan, a region in the south-western part of Pakistan.

The region established its own army to fulfil the dream of secession from the mother country.

Armed separatism

The Balochistan Liberation Army is an insurgent movement that quickly turned into an armed separatist organization. It carries out terrorist actions, consisting of around 1,000 fighters who are mainly active in the ethnic Baloch regions of Pakistan.

The organization aspires to establish a sovereign state in this part of Pakistan.

It mainly targets members of the Pakistani army, and refuses to abide by the law and public order in the Pakistani state.

After a series of bombings and terrorist operations, the Pakistani and British governments classified the organization in 2006 as the first separatist terrorist organization in the Balochistan region.

In 2019, the organization was included in the American list of terrorist organizations.

This came against the background of its calls for killing in the name of race and religion.

The Balochistan Liberation Army appeared, for the first time in the 1970s, specifically in 1973, under the name 'Independent Balochistan Rebel Movement.

The Pakistani government fell afoul of the movement when it arrested nationalist leader Nawab Khair Bakhsh Mori and accused him of killing Judge Nawaz Mori under former president Pervez Musharraf.

Attacks

The Balochistan Liberation Army began a series of attacks on government facilities and security forces in various parts of Balochistan Province in the summer of 2000.

It claimed responsibility for the series of attacks that occurred during that period, especially after it participated in a number of ethnic cleansing operations against non-members of the Baloch ethnicity in the province.

Over time, the attacks expanded to include gas pipelines, electricity towers and national facilities.

The army also launched attacks against military and security forces and army sites, claiming to be keen on determining the fate of the Baloch people and separate the Balochistan region from Pakistan because of the government's monopoly on the region's natural resources and the unequal allocation of jobs to the citizens of the Punjab region at the expense of Baloch indigenous inhabitants of the region.

The army demands autonomy and the building of an independent nation-state.

In 2017, the Alliance of Baloch Resistance Organizations announced the formation of a joint military front.

The Baloch Liberation Army became part of the Alliance of Baloch Resistance Organizations, which includes the Baloch Liberation Army, the Balochistan Liberation Front, the Baloch Republican Army, and the Baloch Republican Guard.

The operations of the alliance focused on the China-Pakistan Economic corridor.

In 2021, the organization's attacks increased by 90%, compared to the previous year.

In 2021, the organization staged 137 operations that left over 130 people dead.