By Staff Reporter
QUETTA: Security forces killed three more militants on Wednesday as a joint military and police offensive in restive Balochistan province pushed its death toll to 88, state media reported, part of a broader crackdown that has claimed 126 lives since early July.
The latest deaths, reported by state-run Pakistan Television citing security sources, came amid intensifying air and ground operations under Operation Shaban, launched after gunmen stormed a police post at the Mangi Dam pumping station in Ziarat, killing 27 officers in one of the deadliest attacks on security forces in recent months.
Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi praised the operation’s progress, according to the state-run Associated Press of Pakistan, calling the campaign against militant networks a success. Soldiers from the army, the paramilitary Frontier Corps, and police have carried out the offensive jointly since it began.
The operation unfolds against a backdrop of sharply worsening violence across the province. A monthly assessment by the Pakistan Institute for Conflict and Security Studies found the country’s overall security situation deteriorated markedly in May after two months of improvement, driven largely by escalating attacks in Balochistan and neighboring Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.
Balochistan bore the brunt of that surge, the report found: 71 attacks in May, up 109 percent from 34 in April. Kidnappings spiked as well — 52 of the 54 abductions recorded nationwide that month occurred in the province, a trend researchers said pointed to militant groups’ growing reach and confidence.
The violence has drawn a sharp response from Islamabad. Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif told a meeting of the Provincial Apex Committee on the National Action Plan last week that the country’s civilian and military leadership had reached what he called a “mutual and singular decision” to eliminate terrorism. Field Marshal Asim Munir, chief of the army staff and chief of defence forces, attended the Quetta session.
The prime minister’s remarks followed a press briefing by Lt. Gen. Ahmed Sharif Chaudhry, director general of the military’s Inter-Services Public Relations wing, who blamed India and Afghanistan for orchestrating a string of recent attacks — including the July 5 assault near Quetta, the July 6 Ziarat police post attack, and a July 7 ambush of an army convoy in Bela.
Grief and gridlock in Ziarat
In Ziarat, the human toll of the Mangi Dam attack remained starkly visible, as a sit-in protest over the killings entered its sixth day with the bodies of seven slain officers still unburied.
Talks between government negotiators and representatives of the protesters and political parties dragged on without resolution. Provincial Home Minister Ziaullah Langove, leading the government’s side, urged grieving families to proceed with burials, saying officials had agreed to most of their demands — including a judicial commission to investigate the attack.
Relatives of the dead officers, joined by political leaders, civil society figures and local residents, kept up the demonstration, pressing for accountability and a forceful response against the militants responsible.
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