While Pakistan is reeling from India’s retaliatory strikes on its terror camps, it has a huge problem to deal with at home. Balochistan is slipping away from Islamabad’s grip. And if former Pakistani Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi is to be believed, it has already slipped out of Pakistan’s control to a great extent. He says the fear factor among ministers and top officials is such that they don’t venture out after dark without security escort, exposing the false narrative of Army chief General Asim Munir that there were just a handful of rebels in Balochistan.
Abbasi, the Pakistani prime minister from 2017 to 2018, in a recent interview revealed the situation in Balochistan is more grim, particularly after nightfall, reported The Balochistan Post. He also challenged the Pakistani Army Asim Munir’s narrative of “1,500 people responsible for unrest in Balochistan”, Abbasi said, “whatever Asim Munir may say is his opinion, I am only stating what I saw”.
The former prime minister’s remarks came on May 5. As if to prove him right, fighters of the Baloch Liberation Army (BLA) killed 14 army personnel on May 6 in two separate attacks in Balochistan’s Bolan and Kech.
FEAR IN BALOCHISTAN. MINISTERS CAN’T MOVE AROUND WITHOUT SECURITY: FORMER PAK PM
Questioning Pakistan’s internal security and governance, Abbasi said that there was an environment of fear and uncertainty across Pakistan’s largest province. He claimed that even senior government officials and ministers were unable to commute without security escorts in the restive province, adding that in the provincial capital city of Quetta, “After dark, the state’s presence on the ground virtually disappears”.
“This is not a breakdown in law and order. It is a sign of the state’s fading authority,” The Balochistan Post quoted Abbasi as saying on May 6.
He added that armed Baloch rebels now openly patrol major highways in the province, set up checkpoints at will, and even seize control of urban areas for hours at a stretch.
Abbasi’s assertion came days before the Baloch Liberation Army (BLA) claimed responsibility for two separate attacks in Balochistan’s Bolan and Kech, which resulted in the deaths of 14 Pakistani Army personnel.
Shahid Khaqan Abbasi served as the Prime Minister of Pakistan from August 2017 to May 2018, representing the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N), following Nawaz Sharif’s disqualification. In 2024, Abbasi parted ways with PML-N, citing the party’s drift from democratic values and inner-party democracy.
The PML-N, led by Nawaz Sharif’s brother Shehbaz Sharif, is now leading a coalition government in Islamabad.
Abbasi, in 2023, had warned that the economic and political crisis was enough to attract a military takeover of Pakistan.
EX-PAK PM ABBASI CHALLENGES ASIM MUNIR’S BALOCHISTAN CLAIMS
Abbasi also slammed Pakistani army chief Asim Munir for his recent claims about the Balochistan unrest. Munir in April claimed that only 1,500 individuals were responsible for the unrest.
“This is a serious misreading of the situation,” Abbasi said.
“Blaming 1,500 people is a way of avoiding the real problem. The reality is that the state [of Pakistan] is no longer fully in control of Balochistan [province],” he added.
Abbasi’s claims are of significance given Balochistan’s strategic importance. It houses several projects of the China-funded CPEC, such as its crown-jewel, the Gwadar Port. The inability to secure the capital city of Quetta, let alone remote areas of Balochistan like Mach, Turbat or Panjgur, where BLA attacks have surged, exposes vulnerabilities in Pakistan’s authority in the province.
WHY BALOCHISTAN IS SLIPPING AWAY FROM PAKISTAN’S GRIP
Pakistan’s federal government, its powerful army, and Chinese assets are facing the fiercest wave of resistance yet from the Baloch rebel groups. The resistance, led by the Baloch Liberation Army (BLA), have intensified attacks on Pakistani security forces and infrastructure built by the Chinese Belt and Road Initiative (BRI)’s China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC).
Balochistan, Pakistan’s largest province by area and mineral-rich yet least populated, has been plagued by a decades-long armed and peaceful movements by ethnic Baloch people over economic marginalisation, resource exploitation, and human rights abuses.
The Pakistani military has responded with heavy-handed tactics, including enforced disappearances and extrajudicial killings.
It’s not just armed groups resisting the Pakistani state. Women like Mahrang Baloch are at the forefront of a peaceful movement, challenging the Pakistani army’s forced disappearances of Baloch men, with courage and defiance.
Some Baloch women, who were once silent survivors, have picked up arms and are turning into suicide bombers.
In March, BLA fighters hijacked a Pakistani train, the Jaffar Express, after detonating explosives in tunnels and on the tracks. They then opened fire on the train, forcing it to halt in the mountainous terrain. At least 40 Pakistani security personnel were killed in the attack.
In 2024, Pakistan’s civil and military security forces witnessed a 40% increase in casualties (383) in Balochistan compared to 2023, according to the South Asia Terrorism Portal.
Now, as Pakistan faces the heat from India with Operation Sindoor, Abbasi’s stark warnings reveal that Balochistan is a challenge the Islamabad-Rawalpindi regime can no longer dismiss as the work of a few.
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