Pakistan train hijack: 190 hostages freed as rescue operation continues for 2nd day

Pakistan security sources on Wednesday said the military had freed 190 train passengers taken hostage by gunmen on the second day of a siege in the mountainous southwest.

More than 450 passengers were on board when a separatist militant group captured the train in a remote frontier district, with an unknown number of hostages still being held.

"So far, 190 passengers have been rescued, and 30 terrorists have been killed. Due to the presence of women and children with suicide bombers, extreme caution is being exercised," security sources told AFP.

"The operation continues to eliminate the remaining militants."

Attacks by separatist groups who accuse outsiders of plundering natural resources in Balochistan, which borders Afghanistan and Iran, have soared in the past few years.

The assault was immediately claimed by the Baloch Liberation Army, who released a video of an explosion on the track followed by dozens of militants emerging from mountainous hiding places and storming onto the carriages.

"Information suggests that some militants have fled, taking an unknown number of hostages into the local mountainous areas," a security official in the area told AFP.

Muhammad Kashif, a senior railway government official in the provincial capital Quetta, told AFP on Tuesday afternoon that the 450 passengers on board had been taken hostage.

Passengers who walked for hours through rugged mountains to reach safety described being set free by the militants.

"Our women pleaded with them, and they spared us," Babar Masih, a 38-year-old Christian labourer told AFP on Wednesday. 

"They told us to get out and not look back. As we ran, I noticed many others running alongside us."

At a railway station in Quetta, paramilitary troops brought empty coffins that will be sent to the site of the incident.

"I can't find the words to describe how we managed to escape. It was terrifying," Muhammad Bilal, who had been travelling with his mother on the Jaffar Express train, told AFP.

Outsiders identified

The BLA has staged a series of recent attacks against security forces and ethnic groups from outside the province they accuse of benefiting from the region's wealth.

The group has demanded an exchange with security forces for its imprisoned members.

The train driver, a police officer and a soldier were killed in the assault, according to paramedic Nazim Farooq and railway official Muhammad Aslam.

Several passengers told AFP that gunmen demanded to see identity cards to confirm who was from outside the province, similar to a spate of recent attacks carried out by the BLA.

"They came and checked IDs and service cards and shot two soldiers in front of me and took the other four to... I don't know where," said one passenger who asked not to be identified, after walking four hours to the nearest train station.

"Those who were Punjabis were taken away by the terrorists," he said.

Around 80 of the released passengers were taken to Quetta under "tight security", said a police official who was not authorised to speak to the media.

Growing insurgency

Authorities restrict access to some areas of Balochistan where many energy and infrastructure projects are backed by China, which has invested billions in the region including in a major port and airport.

The BLA claim the region's natural resources are being exploited by outsiders and has increased attacks targeting Pakistanis from other regions, security forces and foreign infrastructure projects.

The group launched coordinated overnight attacks last year that included taking control of a major highway and shooting dead travellers from other ethnic groups, stunning the country.

The BLA claimed an attack in February that killed 17 paramilitary soldiers and a woman suicide bomber killed a soldier this month.

"The valuable natural resources in Balochistan belong to the Baloch nation," a BLA statement said at the time.

"Pakistani military generals and their Punjabi elite are looting these resources for their own luxury."

Baloch residents regularly stage protests against the state, which they accuse of rounding up innocent people in its crackdown on militancy.

Security forces have been battling a decades-long insurgency in impoverished Balochistan but last year saw a surge in violence in the province compared with 2023, according to the independent Centre for Research and Security Studies.

It found 2024 was the deadliest year for Pakistan in a decade, with violence rising along the Afghanistan border since the Taliban government took back power in Kabul in 2021.

Pakistan blames its neighbour for allowing militant groups safe haven to plan and launch attacks on Pakistan, a charge Kabul denies.