Pakistan army takes control of main railway station in southwest amid armed operation after train hijacking

QUETTA: The Pakistan army took control of a main railway station in the southwestern Balochistan province where dozens of empty coffins were brought on Wednesday, an eyewitness said, as security forces continued a rescue operation to free hundreds of people taken hostage by separatist militants who hijacked a train a day earlier.
The separatist Balochistan Liberation Army (BLA) bombed part of a railway track and stormed the Quetta-Peshawar-bound Jaffar Express on Tuesday afternoon in Mushkaaf, an area in the mountainous Bolan range of Balochistan. The group said on Tuesday night it was holding 214 people as hostages, including military, police and intelligence officials, while a security official said 190 passengers had been rescued by Wednesday afternoon. 
The province has been the site of a low-level separatist insurgency for decades, with separatist groups accusing the government of stripping the province’s natural resources and leaving its people mired in poverty. They say security forces routinely abduct, torture, and execute ethnic Baloch, allegations echoed by human rights campaigners. Government officials and security forces strongly deny violating human rights and say they are uplifting the province through development projects, including multi-billion-dollar schemes funded by China.

On Wednesday afternoon, an Arab News eyewitness described seeing dozens of empty coffins being brought to the Quetta Railway Station in the provincial capital. He said the station was overrun with army personnel while dozens of family members of hostages had arrived in search of their loved ones. These included the family of Amjad Yasin, the 50-year-old driver of the Jaffar Express, who officials said on Tuesday had been killed in the assault. 
“We have been contacting railway officials since yesterday, but no one is telling the truth,” Amir Yasin, the driver’s younger brother, told Arab News. 
“There are multiple reports coming about my brother’s death but how can we believe it until we see his body?” 

Ghulam Muhammad Sumroo, a railway official, told Arab News 16 passengers, including two injured Railway Police officers, had reached Mach Railway Station and were being moved to Quetta, the provincial capital.
Muhammad Abid, a railway employee who was on the train and arrived at Mach Station, described the attack as the most “horrific day” of his life.
“We were sitting in one of the compartments of Jaffar Express when a powerful explosion targeted the train and intense firing started,” he told Arab News over the phone. 
“We hid in the washrooms with other passengers, but then armed men came in and off boarded us from the train,” he added. “After checking our identity cards, they asked us to run on the track. My life flashed before my eyes when I saw dozens of armed men standing on the railway track.”
Muhammad Ashraf, a 68-year-old passenger traveling to Hafizabad in Punjab to meet his daughter, said that when the train departed from Paneer Railway Station, he heard an explosion about seven to eight kilometers into the journey, followed by intense gunfire, saying many people had been killed and injured.

“Armed men boarded the train and asked everyone to leave the train or prepare to die,” he told Arab News, adding that the militants made the passengers walk on the tracks for three and a half hours on foot.
Ashraf said the militants had detained over 200 passengers, in his rough estimate.
One security official with direct knowledge of the ongoing rescue operation to take back control of the train and free hostages said 190 passengers had been freed and at least 30 militants had been killed. 
He said there were suicide bombers aboard the train, who were using women and children as “human shields.”

“Due to the presence of women and children with suicide bombers, extreme caution is being exercised in the operation,” the official said. “Security forces are continuing their operation to eliminate the remaining terrorists.”
The official said the militants were in touch with their “handlers” in Afghanistan, echoing a common accusation by Pakistani security and government officials that a recent spike in militancy was being orchestrated from the neighboring country. The Taliban rulers in Kabul deny they allow Afghan soil to be used by insurgents to plan or carry out terror attacks.
In a statement issued on Wednesday, the BLA, which has demanded a prisoner exchange within 48 hours, said the Pakistan government was not taking its demands seriously and was trying to free hostages through military action.
“BLA warns the enemy that if the Pakistani army commits any further aggression, even if a single bullet is fired, 10 more personnel will be eliminated,” it said.
“If our demands are not met within [the stipulated] time and the state’s stubbornness continues, then 5 hostages will be eliminated for every passing hour after the ultimatum ends.”