ISLAMABAD, Pakistan – During a meeting with U.S. President Donald Trump in the Oval Office in September, Pakistan Army Chief Marshal Asim Munir opened his briefcase with Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif standing next to him.
Inside was a shiny mineral. Their exhibition was part of Pakistan’s latest proposal to the Trump administration. Pakistan was willing to open its minerals to American investment.
Recommended stories
list of 4 itemsend of list
Less than five months later, that promise took a dark turn. Most of Pakistan’s richest mineral deposits are located in Balochistan. The country’s largest and poorest state has long seen a separatist movement fueled by anger over the perception that the interests of local people are being ignored by the federal government. Coordinated attacks across Balochistan on Saturday, in which fighter jets killed 31 civilians and 17 security personnel, and the military shot 145 militants, served as an urgent reminder to Pakistan and potential investors of the challenges facing the province.
Balochistan is also a hub of Chinese investment in Pakistan, making Saturday’s attack particularly sensitive for Islamabad.
Within hours of at least a dozen attacks, Home Minister Mohsin Naqvi blamed neighboring India. “These were not ordinary terrorists. India is behind these attacks. We can be sure that India planned these attacks along with these terrorists,” Naqvi said without providing any evidence to support his claim.
The attackers belonged to the Baloch Liberation Army (BLA). The separatist group has long sought independence for Balochistan and waged a decades-long insurgency against the Pakistani state along with several other armed groups.
In a video posted on social media, BLA leader Bashir Zeb said the attack was part of the group’s “Herov 2.0” operation, a follow-up to a similar coordinated attack launched in August 2024.
India on Sunday rejected Pakistan’s claims, calling them an attempt to divert attention from what it called Pakistan’s “internal flaws.”
“Instead of parroting frivolous allegations every time there is a violent incident, it is better to focus on meeting the long-standing demands of the local people,” Indian Ministry of External Affairs spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal said in a statement.
Amid the blame game, analysts said the roots of Pakistan’s crisis in Balochistan run deeper than any incident and ignoring them will not help Islamabad, which is trying to attract investment from both the United States and China to the province.
root of anxiety
According to the 2023 census, Balochistan is home to around 15 million people out of Pakistan’s 240 million population. Despite being endowed with vast natural resources, it is the poorest state in the country.
It has large reserves of oil, coal, gold, copper, gas, and other resources that generate significant revenue for the federal government.
With Pakistan pledging to provide some of this resource to its closest allies China and the United States under a landmark deal signed last year, concerns persist that escalating violence could not only jeopardize projects worth billions of dollars but also threaten the country’s fragile economic recovery.
Annexed by Pakistan in 1948 shortly after its separation from India, Balochistan has been the scene of a separatist movement almost since its founding.
Since then, the state has seen at least five major uprisings. The latest phase began in the early 2000s, when demands for greater control over local resources gradually escalated into calls for full independence.
The government’s response has been characterized by heavy-handed security operations. Human rights groups have accused authorities of killing and forcibly disappearing thousands of Baloch people suspected of having ties to or sympathizing with separatist groups.
In March, BLA militants carried out one of their most daring attacks, attempting to hijack the Jaffer Express passenger train traveling from Quetta to the northwestern province of Khyber Pakhtankhwa. More than 300 passengers were rescued after more than a day-long operation in which at least 33 militants were killed.
The incident was part of widespread violence across Balochistan and the rest of the country. The province saw at least 254 attacks in 2025, an increase of 26% from the previous year, killing more than 400 people, according to the Pakistan Institute of Peace.
The latest wave of violence comes days after Pakistan hosted a minerals summit aimed at attracting Chinese companies.
China has already invested heavily in the province, including developing Gwadar, Pakistan’s only deep-sea port. The port is a key node in the $60 billion China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC), which aims to connect southwest China with the Arabian Sea.
In September, US-based mining company USSM also signed a $500 million memorandum of understanding to invest in mineral extraction in Pakistan.
Sahel Baloch, a Berlin-based researcher specializing in Balochistan, said there was a “core contradiction” in Pakistan’s efforts to highlight the province’s resources and co-opt international partners without addressing political grievances.
“Instability in Balochistan is not temporary. It is structural, rooted in long-standing grievances over ownership, political exclusion and militarization,” she told Al Jazeera.
He said that as long as violence continues, large-scale mining projects will remain high-risk and heavily securitized, making them viable primarily for “state-backed actors such as China rather than market-driven Western investors.”
“Even Chinese projects under CPEC have faced repeated attacks, forcing Pakistan to deploy thousands of troops just to secure its limited infrastructure,” she added.
Abdul Basit, a research fellow at Singapore’s South Rajaratnam School of International Relations, took a different view, arguing that China, the state’s main investor, and perhaps the United States, are already well aware of the risks.
“China has domestic CPEC investments and the US signed the mineral agreement last September, a full year after Herov 1.0, so both countries know the risk profile and what they are getting into,” Basit told Al Jazeera, referring to another coordinated BLA attack in multiple locations in August 2024.
He added: “Obviously, attacks like this shake investor confidence, but this is a government-to-government deal. These are part of a strategic investment calculation, and neither the US nor China will withdraw their investments.”
Increased financial risk
Pakistan’s economy has struggled for many years, but has faced continued pressure in recent years. The country narrowly avoided defaulting on its debt in the summer of 2023, securing a last-minute bailout from the International Monetary Fund (IMF).
Since then, Pakistan has regained some stability under the latest IMF program, relying on its 25th IMF loan to secure $7 billion in funding.
Despite authorities’ efforts to promote Pakistan as an attractive investment destination, foreign direct investment (FDI) remains weak.
Central bank figures released last month showed a sharp decline from July to December. According to the State Bank of Pakistan, the country received just $808 million in FDI in the first half of fiscal 2026, down from $1.425 billion in the same period last year.
Imtiaz Gul, executive director of the Islamabad-based Center for Research and Security Studies, said the surge in violence in Balochistan and other provinces was discouraging investors.
“No sensible domestic or foreign investor would risk their money in an extremely volatile situation,” he told Al Jazeera, adding that the crisis was “rooted in issues that are concentrated in the province itself and linked to Islamabad’s approach.”
Balochistan also shares a long and porous border with Iran’s Sistan-Baluchistan province. This further strengthens the perception that this region is a “high-risk area” for investors.
“Continued attacks suggest that even the most heavily guarded projects are vulnerable,” she said. “Without local buy-in, there is a greater chance of a backlash.”
External and internal issues
The Jaffer Express train attack in March was followed a month later by another attack in Pahalgam, Indian-administered Kashmir, in which at least 26 people were killed.
These incidents escalated into a four-day military conflict between India and Pakistan in May, marked by missile attacks, drone strikes, and cross-border shelling.
Pakistan has repeatedly accused India of training and aiding Baloch rebels and officially designated the Baloch separatist group as “Fitna al-Hindustan” after the Jaffer Express attack, hinting at Indian involvement.
But Basit said such claims must be supported by reliable evidence.
“This attack took place in broad daylight and was perpetrated by local residents. This is a direct failure of intelligence and local security services. The response time was quick and we were able to regain control, but the question is why such an attack was carried out in a major city in the first place,” he said.
Sahel Baloch said Islamabad’s focus on India is a run-of-the-mill tactic that may provide short-term diplomatic cover but does little to address deeper issues.
“Pakistan is trying to reframe Balochistan from a political conflict to a security issue to garner diplomatic sympathy and fend off domestic scrutiny,” he said, adding that this approach has its limits.
“There is now considerable recognition that insecurity in Balochistan is primarily caused by domestic factors such as enforced disappearances, lack of political autonomy, and economic marginalization,” she said.
Gall said that although local grievances were the focus, prolonged instability could still benefit external actors.
He argued that India could benefit from limiting China’s expansion in the region. “It doesn’t surprise me if there are external motives. That’s why money is being poured into violence and militancy to keep Balochistan on edge,” he said.
Basit stressed that although the conflict has already taken on an international dimension with the involvement of both China and the United States, the roots of the violence remain local.
“External factors always take a backseat as internal fault lines are the main cause of conflict and violence in the state. The government must bridge the gap so that these external factors are not exploited for internal issues,” he said.
