Tuesday, May 25, 2010

Strife in Baluchistan

Six years of strife
Jan Assakzai, The News, May 26, 2010

Since the launch of the 2004 military operation in Balochistan, the landscape and environment in the insurgency-hit province have seen significant shifts. These include rifts within the Baloch insurgents and other Baloch nationalist parties and a further decline in the insurgent groups' power. It is because of the weakened insurgents that the targeting of federal interests in Balochistan has decreased.

This does not mean, however, that more violence does not lie ahead. On the one hand, there is an increase in the number of attacks against ethnic Punjabis and on the other clashes are taking place in educational institutions between militant Baloch and Pakhtun students.

The security landscape in Balochistan remains as much a cause of alarm as it was in August 2004, when President Pervez Musharraf launched his military operation against insurgent nationalist leader Nawab Akbar Bugti and other insurgents.

There is no end in sight to the two parallel struggles in Balochistan, between the Baloch separatists and the nationalists, on one hand, and pro-establishment Baloch sardars and nawabs, on the other.

For complete article, click here
Related:
Is Baluchistan more strategically significant than Afghanistan? - Reuters
Assassination spike threatens new Pakistan flashpoint - AFP
AHB package to bring joy in Balochistan, says President - Online
Talibanisation creeping into Balochistan  - Jan Assakzai (DT)
India and the Baloch insurgency - Hamid Mir, The Hindu

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