Pakistan said on Thursday it had carried out airstrikes on Baloch separatists in Iran, the latest step in a tense standoff after Iran’s missile and drone strikes in the South Asian nation’s border province of Balochistan. Here are some facts about the organization Pakistan targeted and the volatile province at the center of the conflict.
Which Group Did Pakistan Target in Iran?
The Baloch Liberation Front (BLF), which an intelligence officer identified as the target of Pakistan’s operations in Iran, demands independence for Pakistan’s western province of Balochistan.
Ethnic Baloch terrorists have been fighting the government for decades for an independent state, claiming that the central government unfairly abuses the province’s rich gas and mineral resources in Balochistan, which borders Afghanistan and Iran.
The BLF is among the terrorists who frequently target gas plants, infrastructure, and security posts in the region, but they have also begun to commit attacks in other parts of Pakistan.
They also assault Chinese projects and occasionally kill Chinese workers, despite Pakistan’s claims that it is doing all possible to secure the Chinese projects.
What is Balochistan’s significance?
The enormous region of over 15 million people is primarily arid desert and mountainous terrain with undeveloped mineral resources.
It is Pakistan’s largest province by area, but the smallest by population. It borders Iran’s Sistan-Baluchestan province, where Pakistan launched its strikes.
Hundreds of Baloch protesters, many of them women, have marched in the Pakistani capital of Islamabad in recent weeks, citing claims of heavy-handed treatment of those in the province, including enforced disappearances and extrajudicial killings.
Balochistan is a strategic area in China’s massive multibillion-dollar China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC), which is part of President Xi Jinping’s Belt and Road Initiative.
China has conducted mining projects and constructed an international airport and port in Gwadar, the province’s southernmost coastal town.
Barrick Gold, a Canadian miner, controls 50% of the Reko Diq mine in the province’s Chagai area, with the remainder owned by the Pakistani government and the province. Barrick considers the mine to be one of the world’s greatest undeveloped copper and gold deposits.