By Saleem Ahmed and Asif Shahzad, Reuters
Train passengers eat food at the deputy commissioner's office in Quetta on March 12, 2025, after escaping the siege claimed by the Baloch Liberation Army. Photo: AFP
Pakistani security forces stormed a train on Wednesday that had been hijacked by separatist militants, killing all 33 attackers and ending a day-long standoff involving hundreds of hostages, the military said.
Separatist Baloch militants on Tuesday blew up the railway track and hurled rockets at the Jaffar Express when it was on its way to Peshawar in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province from Balochistan's capital of Quetta, a security source said.
The military's spokesperson Ahmed Sharif Chaudhry said 21 hostages and all 33 insurgents had been killed. He said 440 people had been on board.
"Today we freed a large number of people, including women and children ... The final operation was carried out with great care," Chaudhry said, adding that no civilians were killed in the operation.
He said the security forces had cleared the train "bogey to bogey".
The Baloch Liberation Army, which claimed the attack, is the largest of several ethnic armed groups battling the government in Balochistan, which borders Afghanistan and Iran.
The militants have in recent months stepped up their activities using new tactics to inflict high death and injury tolls and target Pakistan's military.
Baloch militant groups say they have been fighting for a larger share in the regional wealth of mines and minerals.
On Wednesday evening, before the army announcement, the BLA said it had killed 50 passengers.
The BLA had threatened to start executing hostages unless authorities met its 48-hour deadline for the release of Baloch political prisoners, activists, and missing people it says were abducted by the military.
Hundreds of troops and teams in helicopters have been drafted into the effort to rescue the hostages in the remote mountainous area where the train was stopped. The train driver and several others had already been killed, officials said, before the militants' latest statement.
Hours before the BLA made its announcement on the 50 hostages, the security official said all the militants at the site had been killed and the operation had entered its "final phase". Reuters was also not able to verify the official's account.
Junior Interior Minister Talal Chaudhry told Geo television earlier on Wednesday that militants were wearing suicide vests as they sat among the passengers held hostage, complicating the rescue attempt. He said 70-80 attackers had hijacked the train.
A soldier hands out tea to freed train passengers gathered at the Mach railway station, which has been turned into a makeshift hospital. Photo: AFP
Families urge action
The security source told Reuters there were 425 people on the train when it was attacked on its way to Peshawar in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province from Balochistan's capital of Quetta.
After seizing control of the train, the insurgents began pulling passengers off and checking their identification, the source said.
"They were looking for soldiers and security personnel," the official said, estimating that at least 11 people, including paramilitary troops, had been killed.
More than 50 of those rescued arrived in Quetta on Wednesday, to be reunited with distraught relatives.
A woman, who said her son was among the passengers, confronted provincial minister Mir Zahoor Buledi when he visited those freed.
"Please bring my child back," she said. "Why didn't you stop the trains if they were not safe?"
Buledi told reporters the government was working to beef up security in the region.
A Reuters journalist saw nearly 100 empty coffins at Quetta railway station, where more of those aboard the Jaffar Express were expected to arrive.
Pakistan Railways has suspended services from the provinces of Punjab and Sindh to Balochistan until security agencies confirm the area is safe, media said on Wednesday.
-Reuters
