Armed militants have taken 450 passengers hostage and wounded the train driver during a ‘terrorist attack’ in Pakistan’s volatile southwestern Balochistan province, officials said.
The separatist Baloch Liberation Army has threatened to execute all the hostages it has in its custody if the Pakistani authorities attempt to intervene.
“Over 450 passengers onboard are being held hostage by gunmen,” Muhammad Kashif, a senior railway government official in Quetta, the capital of the province, told reporters.
The train was trapped inside a tunnel after the attack, during which it came under fire and the driver was wounded, police and railway officials said.
In a statement, the BLA claimed responsibility for the hijacking and said six military personnel had been killed in the gunfight.
The group said they had taken hostages from the train, including security forces, with the exact number in their custody unclear.
“During this operation, BLA fighters have released women, children, and Baloch passengers, ensuring that all remaining hostages are serving personnel of the occupying forces,” the group said in a statement.
No contact has been established with the 450 passengers and staff aboard the nine-coach train, railway officials told local media.
The Jaffar Express had been on its way from Quetta in Pakistan’s southwestern Balochistan province to Peshawar in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa when it was fired on, officials said.
A spokesperson for the Balochistan government said that the attack was an act of terrorism, adding that an investigation into it is underway.
There had been reports of heavy fire on the railway, the spokesperson said, however due to the difficult terrain in the area it has been difficult for authorities to reach the scene.
He added that a relief train had been dispatched to the scene and that security forces are working in the area.
A senior police official from the area said that ‘the train remains stuck just before a tunnel surrounded by mountains’.
The area where the train is halted is a mountainous region making it easier for militants to have hideouts and plan attacks.
A state of emergency has been declared in Sibi Hospital and ambulances have been sent to the scene but are having difficulty accessing it, according to officials.
The number of hostages taken could not be confirmed by railway or local government officials.
Pakistan’s interior minister, Mohsin Naqvi, condemned the attack and said the government would not make any concessions to ‘beasts who fire on innocent passengers’.
The Balochistan government has imposed emergency measures to deal with the situation, Rind said.
Trains in Balochistan typically have security personnel on board as separatists have previously carried out deadly attacks on trains and security forces in the region.
In November, a separatist group carried out a suicide bombing at a train station in Quetta that killed 26 people, including security personnel, railway staff and passengers.
A decades-old insurgency in Balochistan by separatist militant groups has led to frequent attacks against the government, army and Chinese interests in the region, pressing demands for a share in its resources.
The oil- and mineral-rich Balochistan is Pakistan’s largest but also least populated province.
It is a hub for the country’s ethnic Baloch minority whose members say they face discrimination and exploitation by the central government.
The BLA seeks independence for Balochistan. It is the biggest of several ethnic insurgent groups that have battled the South Asian nation’s government for decades, saying it unfairly exploits Balochistan’s rich gas and mineral resources.
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