Radicalized Balochs, And The Risk Of An Iran-Pakistan Conflagration

In less than 24 hours, earlier this month, Iran launched ballistic missile attacks on three countries in the region: Iraq, Syria and Pakistan.

In a series of statements, Iran said the attacks destroyed Israeli Mossad headquarters in Erbil in the Iraqi Kurdistan region, a gathering of extremist terrorist groups in Idlib, in northern Syria. It also struck military sites of the anti-Iranian group Jaish al-Adl, or the Army of Justice, near Panjgur in the Pakistani province of Balochistan. Tehran said the attacks were a way to hold accountable those who endangered its national security.

While Syria’s government has remained silent, Iraqi Foreign Minister Fuad Hussein called the attacks a violation of the country’s sovereignty, and he said he would file a complaint with the UN Security Council against Iran. “The Iranians do not want to or cannot attack Israel, so they looked for victims around them,” he said.

Pakistan, meanwhile, responded in kind in less than 48 hours. It launched a missile attack on the Saravan region in the Iranian province of Balochistan, targeting the hideouts of Pakistani Baloch separatists sponsored by Tehran.

The tit-for-tat strikes between brotherly countries, as Iran and Pakistan call themselves, brought the Baloch issue back to the forefront.

An ethnic and religious secessionist minority, the Baloch people live in areas along the borders of the two countries. Iran has long accused Pakistan of protecting the Jaish al-Adl, which opposes Iran’s theocratic regime. Pakistan, meanwhile, accuses Iran of harboring Baloch rebels affiliated with the Balochistan Liberation Army (BLA) and Balochistan Liberation Front (BLF).

Who are the Baloch people?

The Baloch people live in three neighboring countries: Pakistan, Iran and Afghanistan. They are centered in two regions that constitute the historical lands of Balochistan: a mountainous area in the north with a nomadic tribal structure, and an agricultural plain area in the south with a weak tribal structure. An ethnically heterogeneous people, they are originally Iranian tribes with Aryan roots and were joined by migrants from non-Muslim communities, including Hindu and Sikh merchants, and an Arab group living in Oman and the United Arab Emirates

According to inaccurate statistics, their number exceeds 12 million people, most of whom are Sunni Muslims. There are two minority groups: a Shia Ismaili group in the northwestern regions of Iranian Balochistan, and a Baha’i minority. They speak the Balochi language, which is very similar to Persian, Kurdish, Pashto, Dari and Urdu.

In modern history, the regions of Balochistan saw political protests, rebellion and national resistance movements that aimed at establishing Greater Balochistan, a region that enjoys a kind of autonomy. In the past two decades, extremist religious groups have grown at the expense of secular parties. Such groups adopted jihadist Islam, leading to the emergence of militant groups such as Jund Allah, Jaish al-Adl and BLF.

Experts blame oppression and ethnic superiority by the governments of Iran, Pakistan and Afghanistan for the emergence of such militant groups. The governments, experts say, ignored the Balochs’ just political demands and imposed punitive policies which impoverished the region and fueled the creation of militant groups.

Pakistan and separatist tendencies

Since its independence, Pakistan has faced separatist tendencies and rebellious movements by the Baloch minority under the BLA banner. The Pakistani military launched multiple crackdown campaigns on the separatists’ stronghold but the groups reemerged and created the BLF along with the BLA.

Islamabad did not take these demands seriously.

Meanwhile, a civil movement emerged, calling for peaceful struggle and political process. It demanded the formation of a federal government that would consider the Balochs’ privacy and rightful share of the natural oil and gas wealth in their areas. They also called for political and cultural freedoms, civil rights and protection from violations including assassinations, forced disappearance and imprisonment.

The Islamabad government did not, however, take these demands seriously, leading to the movement’s eventual disappearance and the strengthening of the armed groups. An ethnic conflict has emerged, with blame falling mainly on the central government.

​Iran and the Baloch minority

Iran’s Sistan and Baluchistan region, like other peripheral regions, was inhabited by a minority that extended into the neighboring country. Therefore, it was vulnerable to the explosion of political crises with the central government.

During the British occupation, a secessionist movement was active there, coinciding with the constitutional revolution in Tehran, at the beginning of the 20th century. The movement had briefly established an independent local government with Britain’s support.

In Pakistan, the unrest and rebellion was less severe than in Iran — until Iran’s Islamic Revolution in late 1970s. Then, unrest grew and took a sectarian dimension.

The post-revolution Shia government in Tehran adopted discriminate sectarian policies against the Sunni minority. That coincided with the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan and the formation of jihadist groups, which pushed the Sunni Balochi majority to embrace Salafist ideas.

The Jund Allah armed group, led by Abdul Malik Rigi emerged at this time, with the stated goal of achieving rights for the Baloch people through armed struggle — not secession from Iran. Iran crushed the group and executed its leader. New group groups formed: Jaish al-Adl, led by Muhammad Zahir Baloch; and Jaish al-Nasr, led by Abdul Raouf Rigi, brother of Abdul Malik, who was killed during an armed confrontation inside Pakistan.

Experts say that Iran’s rapid elimination of the group was due to the small number of Baloch, their extreme poverty and the high rate of illiteracy and unemployment in the region. Tehran also coordinated with Islamabad to dismantle such groups.

Baloch safe haven in Afghanistan

Most of the Afghan Balochs — more than 3 million people — live in the state of Nimroz. Successive Afghan governments have given them their civil rights, including the right to learn in their mother tongue in schools and universities, such as Kandahar University for example.

Unlike their counterparts in Iran and Pakistan, the Afghan Balochs have never suffered from marginalization, racism or sectarian discrimination, except for the Shia minority, which was exterminated by Mullah Omar, the spiritual leader of the Afghan Taliban movement.

The Balochs of Afghanistan have not formed political parties, but they practice political work through councils, associations, and social and cultural organizations. They have fraternal relations with the Baloch political parties in Iran and Pakistan. Their regions have always been a safe haven for the Baloch fleeing the oppression of Iranian and Pakistani security services.

Now, both Tehran and Islamabad have pressured Afghanistan to stop receiving separatists and bar its Baloch citizens from joining political parties in both Iran and Pakistan.

The language of missiles

Iranian-Pakistani relations have always been governed by tensions, despite the “mandatory” security harmony between them. The tensions caused bloody strife between Sunni and Shia groups in Pakistan. Anti-Iranian government groups also launched attacks in the Sistan and Baluchestan province, causing serious damage to Iranian forces. But the countries’ response never reached the level of missile attacks.

Recently, attacks against military and security forces have increased in both countries, and each side accuses the other of ignoring the militants’ activities on its territory.

Islamabad insists that the Jaish al-Adl has no organized presence in Pakistan, and its militants may be hiding in remote areas of Balochistan. It claims to have arrested members of them involved in terrorist attacks against Iran, while Baloch separatists continue to attack Pakistani forces from Iranian territory.

Islamabad accuses Tehran of supporting the militants militarily and materially, and providing them safe havens on its territory. Iran denies the accusations.

Iran launched its attack inside Pakistan, while Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amirabdollahian was meeting with Pakistan’s interim Prime Minister, Anwaar-ul-Haq Kakar, on the sidelines of the Davos Summit in Switzerland. Amirabdollahian said during the meeting that the fight against terrorism was an important issues for the two countries. While Kakar said that his country and Iran face common challenges in the region, and must make joint efforts to reduce terrorist threats.

Iran is concerned about the triangle where the borders of Iran, Pakistan and Afghanistan meet.

In this context, it is difficult to know the motives behind the Iranian attack on Pakistan. One motive could have been Jaish al-Adl’s recent attack in the city of Rask and the suicide bombings in Kerman.

Iran accuses Israeli intelligence, which is active in Pakistan, of being behind the Kerman bombings, even though the Islamic State has claimed responsibility. Tehran said its security services monitored the entry of one Kerman attackers from the Pakistani side, accompanied by a woman and a child.

Iran is concerned about the security of the triangle where the borders of Iran, Pakistan and Afghanistan meet. The area is guarded by the Quds Force, a powerful branch of the Revolutionary Guard.

Journalists, meanwhile, said the attack on Pakistan could be viewed as a show of force by the Revolutionary Guard, in a message mainly directed to the Iranian people.

To protest the attack, Islamabad recalled its ambassador from Tehran, and did not allow the ambassador of the Islamic Republic in Iran to return to its territory. Two days after the Iranian attack, Pakistan’s military launched retaliatory attacks in Saravan, Iran against anti-Pakistan armed groups inside Iran. A nuclear power, Islamabad apparently sought to respond to the Iran in the same language: missiles.

Ties between Iran and Pakistan remain close.