United Press International, The southwestern Pakistani province of Baluchistan has turned into a battlefield with both government and armed tribesmen preparing for a major clash that could cause hundreds of deaths and start a rebellion that would be difficult to put out.
Journalists who visited the area Tuesday reported that civilians had already fled a 40-mile area in and around the small tribal town of Dera Bugti.
“All one could see were hundreds of heavily armed Bugti tribesmen.Other than that, there were only signs of the heavy ordnance used — perhaps from both sides — in the shape of shrapnel and spent rocket shells,” said BBC's Zafar Abbas in a report.
Other journalists said the town looked like a ghost town or a war zone, with both government troops and tribesmen waiting for a showdown.Initial clashes have already killed scores of people.
The government claims that about 5,000 armed tribesmen have surrounded 300 troops and are threatening to kill them.
Leader of the rebel tribesmen, Nawab Akbar Bugti, does not confirm or deny the government's claim.Instead he told the parliamentary and media delegation that met him in Dera Bugti Tuesday that “the troops are outsider and they should vacate our lands.”
Baluchistan is a particularly sensitive area because it borders Iran and the Afghan province of Kandahar, which is the home base of the Taliban movement.The region also offers the neartest port for landlocked, but oil-rich Central Asia.Although trouble in Baluchistan has been simmering for a long time, the Jan. 2 rape of a woman doctor, Shazia Khalid, in the nearby town of Sui sparked the current crisis.The native Bugti tribe, which is part of the ethnic Baluch group, blamed an army officer for the rape.The government denied the charge, but ordered an inquiry which exonerated the officer.The tribesmen refused to accept the result and started attacking troops and government installations across Baluchistan.
Khalid has since left Pakistan for London and has urged the tribesmen not to politicize her ordeal, but bombings and attacks on government troops have continued.Thirty-nine people were killed Saturday in an apparent suicide bomb attack at a shrine the government blamed on ethnic Baluch rebels.
The Baluch are the largest ethnic group in Baluchistan and are divided into several tribes and sub-tribes.The Mari and Bugti tribes are the largest.The Bugtis live in and around Sui, an area that also contains Pakistan's largest deposits of natural gas.
Since January, tribesmen have blocked gas supply to the rest of the country on several occasions, forcing the government to order gas rationing for both domestic and industrial users.
The Bugti tribe, especially its chief Nawab Akbar Bugti, demand a greater share in gas revenue and more administrative control over their area.The government says it already gives millions of dollars to the Bugti chief who uses the money to buy weapons instead of development.
But troubles in Baluchistan are older than the gas dispute or the row involving the Jan. 2 rape.Before 1947, when India and Pakistan became independent countries, Baluchistan was a semi-autonomous territory within British India.After 1947, it was annexed to Pakistan, against the wishes of some Baloch tribal chiefs.
Like the British before them, the Pakistanis have had troubles with the Baloch tribes for more than half a century.At least once, in the early 1970s, clashes between tribesmen and government troops led to a major military operation, resulting in the death of hundreds of people on both sides.
“The government is now planning a second operation,” said Baluchi leader Sherbaz Mazari in a statement.”They are using the current unrest as an excuse to launch the operation and have already severed communication links to the area.”
The government denied the charge.”We do not want a military operation.We want to settle this dispute peacefully,” Information Minister Shaikh Rashid told reporters in Islamabad.
“We sent a parliamentary and media delegation on Tuesday to open negotiations with the Bugti chief,” he said.”The delegation also included opposition lawmakers.This shows our sincerity.”
But Baloch leaders refer to a statement President Pervez Musharraf gave on Jan. 4, two days after the rape that started the current trouble.”Don't push us.It is not the '70s, when you can hit and run, and hide in the mountains,” Musharraf said in a statement issued in January, alluding to the military operation to quell the insurgency in Baluchistan in the 1970s.”This time, you won't even know what hit you.”
“They have killed my people.They may even kill me,” the ageing Bugti chief told reporters who greeted him at his home.”But they cannot kill the entire Baluch nation.”Journalists who visited the area Tuesday say Bugti and his men are bracing themselves for a final show down with the military.They saw thousands of tribesmen armed with rocket launchers and automatic rifles, setting up trenches, check posts and roadblocks.
Pakistan also has pressed thousands of troops into the area and authorities have vowed to keep gas deposits under their control.Both sides are patrolling the area.Last week's clashes, according to some reports, resulted in more than 30 deaths.
“The situation is so tense that even a small incident could start a war,” said a reporter for Pakistan's private Geo Television channel.
Bugti tribesmen are supported by the Baluchistan Liberation Army, a new militant group which demands independence for the province.
The government blames this group for fuelling the current unrest and the BLA admits carrying out bomb attacks on government targets.
The Bugti chief blames the government for the growth in the support for BLA.”The government should be asking why so many people in Baluchistan support the BLA.The BLA's agenda clearly strikes a chord with the Baluch population.”
Bugti, the BLA and other Baluchi nationalists are also opposed to the government's plan to build a new port city in Baluchistan.They argue that Gwadar port will bring millions of new immigrants from other provinces and this will turn the Baloch into a minority in their own province.There are only 6 million Baloch in a country of almost 150 million people.
They also fear that the government is trying to strengthen its control over Baluchistan by building new cantonments.
“We will fight till last man and last bullet but will not allow them to turn us into a minority in Balochistan,” said a BLA statement.
And if a political solution to the current crisis is not found soon, it seems that the BLA will not have to wait long for a full-fledged war with the Pakistan Army.
