PM Sharif calls for improving goods transportation at Karachi port amid Pakistan trade push

QUETTA: At least five soldiers of the paramilitary Frontier Corps (FC) personnel were killed and 11 others injured on Sunday morning after their convoy was targeted in a blast in southwestern Pakistan, a police official said. 

The latest attack took place at the N-40 highway connecting Pakistan to neighboring Iran in Nushki district. A convoy of seven Frontier Corps buses was traveling to Taftan from the provincial capital of Quetta when it was hit by a “powerful explosion” near Rakhshani Mill, Zafar Sumalani, station house officer at the Nushki Police Station, told Arab News. 

“Five security personnel were killed in the attack and 11 others injured,” Sumalani said. “The number of casualties might increase as the bus carrying dozens of FC soldiers was completely destroyed.”

The doctor said the critically injured were shifted to the Combined Military Hospital (CMH) in Nushki and were later shifted to Quetta for treatment. 

Pakistan’s Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif condemned the blast in a statement shared by his office. The prime minister directed authorities to provide medical treatment to the injured, the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) said. 

“Such cowardly acts cannot shake our resolve against terrorism,” Sharif was quoted as saying by the PMO. 

No group has claimed responsibility for the blast but suspicion is likely to fall on the Baloch Liberation Army (BLA), the most prominent ethnic Baloch separatist outfit in the province.

The blast takes place days after BLA militants stormed the Jaffar Express train on Tuesday in a remote mountain pass in Balochistan after blowing up train tracks. The militants held over 400 passengers hostage in a day-long standoff before the military rescued them.

Pakistan security forces killed 33 insurgents, rescued 354 hostages before bringing the siege to a close on Wednesday, according to army spokesperson Lt. Gen. Ahmed Sharif Chaudhry. A final count showed 23 soldiers, three railway employees and five passengers had died in the attack.

Oil-and-mineral-rich Balochistan is Pakistan’s largest and least populated province. Ethnic Baloch separatists have long accused the central government of discrimination, which Islamabad denies.

The military has a huge presence in Balochistan bordering Afghanistan and Iran. The army has long run intelligence-based operations against insurgent groups such as the BLA, who have escalated attacks in recent months on the military and nationals from longtime ally China, which is building key projects in the region, including a port at Gwadar.

More than 50 people, including security forces, were killed in August last year in a string of assaults in Balochistan that were claimed by the BLA.

ISLAMABAD: Iraqi Special Forces have completed an over two-month-long training course at the National Counter Terrorism Center (NCTC) in northwestern Pakistan, state-run media reported on Sunday, as both countries eye bolstering military and defense cooperation for regional security. 

The Iraqi personnel arrived in Pakistan in December 2024 to undergo training at the NCTC located in Pabbi town in Pakistan’s northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) province. 

“Pakistani military institutions are playing an important role in providing counter-terrorism training and enhancing security cooperation in the region,” state broadcaster Radio Pakistan reported. 

It added that the cooperation for military training between the two states dates back to 1955, under which the Pakistan Army agreed to train Iraqi Special Forces. 

The state broadcaster said that the Pakistan Army will train more Iraqi Special Forces personnel at the NCTC, describing the center as an “internationally renowned training center with modern facilities.”

Pakistan and Iraq have strengthened ties in recent years through defense cooperation, with Islamabad frequently providing training to Iraqi security forces. 

In 2014, Iraq procured Super Mushak trainer aircraft from Pakistan to bolster defense relations between the two Muslim-majority nations.