Islamabad, Pakistan: In the 10 days between March 16 and 26, Pakistan witnessed five separate attacks, three in its northwestern province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and two in its southwestern province of Balochistan, which left at least 18 people dead.
All five attacks were suicide bombings that killed at least 12 military personnel, five Chinese nationals and one Pakistani national.
While the country has experienced a dramatic surge in violence over the past year, the latest spate of attacks, their targets and the audacity with which they were carried out may signal a new chapter in Pakistan’s fight against militant groups, analysts say.
The latest three attacks, coming in such quick succession, appear to be directed against Chinese interests in Pakistan. First, armed militants attacked the Pakistani port of Gwadar in Balochistan, which was built with Chinese help. An armed group then attacked one of Pakistan’s largest naval bases, also in Balochistan, citing Chinese investment in the region as its motivation. Finally, militants targeted Chinese engineers working on a Chinese-funded hydroelectric project in the north of the country, near the town of Besham.
This pattern has raised concerns among Pakistan’s security services, who believe attacks on Chinese in Pakistan are part of a “larger plan” to harm the country’s economic interests as well as sabotage ties between the countries, said Iftikhar Firdous, an analyst security and armed groups researcher.
“iron brothers”
China is one of Pakistan’s closest allies and has invested $62 billion in the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC), an infrastructure project that spans a series of highways linking southwestern China to the Arabian Sea port of Gwadar.
The attack on Chinese workers prompted a sharp response from Beijing. “China asks Pakistan to thoroughly investigate the incident as soon as possible, track down the perpetrators and bring them to justice. In the meantime, we request Pakistan to take effective measures to protect the safety and security of Chinese citizens, institutions and projects in Pakistan,” the Ministry of External Affairs said on March 27.
In response, the Pakistani government said it would bring “terrorists and their facilitators and supporters to justice” and announced the formation of an investigative team to further investigate the attacks.
“Pakistan and China are close friends and iron brothers. We have no doubt that the terrorist attack in Besham was organized by the enemies of Pakistan-China friendship. Together, we will act decisively against all such forces and defeat them,” the foreign ministry said in a statement released a day later.
Chinese interests have also been attacked many times in the past. Two gunmen targeted a convoy of 23 Chinese engineers in Gwadar in August last year, but their attack was thwarted by security officials.
In July 2021, at least nine Chinese engineers working on a hydroelectric project were killed when a suicide bomber plowed into their bus, in an attack that was eerily similar to the one that took place on March 26.
But what distinguishes the two attacks is that while the incidents in Balochistan were readily claimed by insurgent separatist groups, the attack in the north was not claimed by either group.
A wider pattern of armed attacks
The attacks in Balochistan were claimed by the military wing of the Balochistan Liberation Army (BLA), one of many hard-line armed groups seeking to secede from Pakistan.
Balochistan is the country’s largest province by area, but also the poorest, although it is rich in natural resources, including reserves of oil, coal, gold, copper and gas. This has led to accusations by many in Balochistan that successive Pakistani governments have ignored their concerns while exploiting the province and favoring “foreigners”. The province has seen at least five insurgent movements since the creation of Pakistan in 1947. The government has been accused of launching a violent crackdown and allegedly killing and disappearing thousands of ethnic Baloch people who are believed to be insurgents or supporters of the insurgency.
However, a significant increase in violent incidents in the country over the past two years coincided with the return of the Afghan Taliban to power in August 2021. In 2023, more than 650 attacks killed nearly 1,000 people, mostly linked to security forces.
Groups carrying out attacks include the Islamic State’s regional affiliate, called the Islamic State in Khorasan Province, ISKP (ISIS-K) and other, more obscure organizations such as Tehreek-e-Jihad Pakistan (TJP), among others.
The biggest challenge to the Pakistani state, however, comes from the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), a militant group formed in 2007 that has targeted civilians as well as law enforcement officials, resulting in thousands of deaths.
The TTP threat
Ideologically aligned with the Afghan Taliban, the TTP demands the reversal of the merger of Pakistan’s northwestern tribal regions with Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province and stricter enforcement of their interpretation of Islamic law in the region.
But the TTP – which unilaterally ended the ceasefire in November 2022 and has since stepped up its attacks on Pakistani security forces – issued a statement after the Besham attack saying it was not involved.
This, Firdous said, could point to the involvement of religiously inspired armed groups and individuals who do not declare affiliation with any established armed groups.
“Jihadist freelancers, the Pakistani military believes, are run by hostile intelligence agencies, a term usually used to refer to neighboring India,” Firdous, who is also the founding editor of The Khorasan Diary, a non-partisan research platform, told Al Jazeera .
The security analyst also said that while almost all “jihadi armed factions” in Afghanistan and Pakistan have been anti-China because of the crackdown on its Uyghur minority, Afghanistan’s rulers, the Afghan Taliban, have been quiet.
“The Afghan Taliban, after taking over the country, remained silent on the issue, but groups operating under the Taliban umbrella disagree and see China as an oppressor of Muslims,” Firdous said. “Thus, if individuals associated with larger groups attacked the Chinese, there are no official claims that could perhaps explain why the TTP denied involvement in the attack.”
Fahd Humayun, an assistant professor of political science at Tufts University in the United States, said he believed the Besham attack was carried out by either “an affiliate of the TTP or the ISKP” and was clearly intended to target Pakistan-China relations. to raise spending for foreign governments and private companies to invest in Pakistan.
“Although the TTP issued a statement denying its involvement in the attack, it is worth remembering that it has incentives to maintain plausible deniability because of its association with the Afghan Taliban, who would oppose targeting the Chinese,” Humayun told Al Jazira. “This is consistent with the objectives of such armed organizations to challenge the authority of the state and promote internal destabilization.”
Baluch anti-Chinese sentiments
At the same time, Firdous said Baloch insurgent groups see China as a superpower with an expansionist agenda that is taking away their resources without their consent.
“The groups are indiscriminately threatening the Pakistan Army as well as foreign investors, especially Chinese nationals, who have been attacked quite a few times over the years,” he added.
With increasing activity seen in Balochistan by insurgent groups, Firdous said suicide squads of the BLA’s armed wing had carried out “three major attacks using more than 24 suicide bombers” this year alone, which he said signaled a change in strategy.
“They have gone from hit and run to direct attacks on Pakistani security forces bases. This trend shows increasing recruitment in the ranks of Baloch insurgent groups,” said Firdous.
He says it is “decisive” that the government prioritizes the development and welfare of Balochistan by ensuring that the province benefits from its own resources and that local people are empowered to participate in decision-making processes that affect lives them
“Until these issues are resolved, the Baloch insurgency is likely to continue and pose a significant challenge to the economic stability and security of Balochistan and the rest of the country,” Firdous said.
