More than 120 people were killed in bomb blasts in Pakistan this week. The biggest death toll resulted from a co-ordinated double bombing that targeted the country’s Shiite minority in Quetta, the capital of Balochistan. It left at least 90 dead and injured more than 100.
A suicide bomber targeted a Quetta billiard hall on Thursday, Jan 10, evening, killing 10 people. Then, 20 minutes later a car bomb tore through the crowd of relatives, rescue workers, police and journalists who had gathered at the site.
The Sunni extremist group, Lashkar-e-Jhangvi, which is notorious for its violent sectarian attacks on Shiites, has claimed responsibility for the double bombing.
On the same day, a bomb blast at a Sunni religious gathering in Mingora in the northern Swat Valley killed another 22 people and injured more than 80. No group has claimed responsibility.
Earlier on Thursday, a bomb planted under a security force vehicle in a crowded part of Quetta, left 11 people dead and dozens wounded. The latter blast has been attributed to the United Baloch Army, one of several armed Balochi separatist militias operating in the province.
It is no accident that Quetta was at the centre of Thursday’s violence. The city is a cauldron of ethnic and sectarian animosities that have been cultivated and manipulated by sections of the Pakistani ruling elites over decades.
The twin bomb blast was aimed at the city’s sizable ethnic Hazara population. They are regularly targeted by Sunni Islamists because of their Shiite religion; the Sunni extremists also accuse the Hazaras of being both spies for the US military and agents for the Shiite regime in next-door Iran.
After the blasts, Hazara leaders organised protests of several thousand people demanding army’ deployment to protect their community. The Hazara Democratic Party (HRD) called on the military to carry out “targeted operations” against the militias attacking Shia Muslims.
The security forces have a heavy presence in Quetta and throughout Balochistan where they have been engaged in long-running operations against Balochi separatist groups and are notorious for their brutal methods, including “disappearances” and extra-judicial killings. Sections of the Pakistani military have connections to Sunni extremist groups, including the Lashkar-e-Jhangvi.
LeJ was established in the 1990s as a breakaway from Sipah-e-Sahaba Pakistan (SSP). The SSP was formed in reaction to the supposed Shiite “threat” posed by the Iranian Revolution in 1979. In the 1980s, the SSP was nurtured by the US-backed military dictator Zia-ul-Haq along with other Pakistani Sunni militias as part of his “Islamization” of the country.
These groups were used by Pakistan’s military-intelligence apparatus not only in the anti-Soviet jihad in Afghanistan, but in mounting attacks inside Jammu and Kashmir. Despite being illegal, Lashkar-e-Jhangvi operates several training camps inside Balochistan.
Sectarian violence increased markedly in Pakistan in 2012, with the minority Shiites being a particular target. According to Human Rights Watch, more than 400 Shiite Muslims were killed in Pakistan last year and of those, 120 were from Balochistan.
Balochistan has strategic importance for Pakistan and the region as a whole. Pakistan’s nuclear testing sites are here in this province which is the most backward of the four provinces in the country. It is rich natural resources-wise. The province is strategically located next to Iran. It is also home to one of the key supply routes used by NATO forces through Pakistan to Afghanistan.
Gwadar port, which China has built for Pakistan as a part of ‘string of pearls’, is a Balochistan asset. Islamabad’s plans to hand over the port management to the Chinese has handed over to the Chinese managers
More broadly, the Obama administration is deliberately encouraging Sunni extremist groups throughout the region as it tacitly backs Al Qaeda-linked fighters in its proxy war inside Syria to oust the regime of Bashar al-Assad and targets Iran for military intervention. Funding and arms for the Syrian militias have come from Saudi Arabia and the Gulf states—all US allies.
Saudi support for Sunni extremists in Pakistan including Lashkar-e-Jhangvi continues. In response, Iran reportedly backs armed Shiite groups inside Balochistan in particular.
Seen purely in Pakistan’s domestic perspective, the increase in sectarian violence is proportional to the worsening economic and social crisis in the country. Since there is no shortcut for economic nirvana, Pakistan leadership must revisit their plans and policies which have pushed the country into the present cauldron.
