The recent attack on a train in Quetta has once again brought into focus a question that should not really require much debate. The Baluchistan Liberation Army, or BLA, is a terrorist organisation and ought to be treated as one.

The train attack was not some isolated eruption of violence. It was part of a pattern that has become all too familiar. Over the years, the BLA has attacked railway stations, passenger buses, universities, diplomatic facilities, economic institutions, foreign nationals and ordinary civilians. The victims have included labourers, teachers, students, travellers and workers whose only crime was being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

There is another aspect of the BLA’s violence that deserves attention. Many of its victims have been selected not for what they did but for who they were.

There is another aspect of the BLA’s violence that deserves attention. Many of its victims have been selected not for what they did but for who they were.

The attack on the Jaffer Express, in the recent past, demonstrated the scale of the threat. Civilians and security personnel lost their lives, while hundreds of passengers were taken hostage. It was a shocking incident, but not an unprecedented one. The organisation’s history is littered with similar acts of violence.

In November 2024, a suicide bomber struck a........

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