Based on the above arguments, the author of the study concluded that it was not the efficiency-based technocratic criterion alone that had created the current crisis. Instead, it was the political preferences of the ruling party and its obsession with the 2018 general elections that explained the discriminatory design of the CPEC. ‘The PML-N may succeed in appeasing its political constituency and secure victory in the 2018 elections but that was likely to happen at a great cost to the already fragile federal integrity,’ was the report’s conclusion.17
Baloch View: Benefits for Balochistan?
Not only are nationalist forces opposing the project, both the treasury and opposition members of Balochistan assembly have complained that the project was being directly controlled by the federal government and that they were not even told the details of Gwadar’s master plan.
Thus, the then federal minister for ports and shipping and president of the National Party (NP) Senator Mir Hasil Khan Bizenjo hedged his bets and made contradictory statements. On the one hand, he stated that he didn’t know if the CPEC was in the interest of the Baloch people or not, but they were monitoring the project closely. On the other, he said that NP considered the CPEC a positive step and it was in favour of development of Balochistan.18
For the Baloch who have suffered at the hands of the Pakistani state since 1947-48, any assurances on CPEC are met with a lot of cynicism. Natural gas from Sui is a glaring example of how the Baloch were deprived of their resources. Even today, 80 per cent of Balochistan is deprived of gas, including Gwadar. Moreover, the development of Gwadar would adversely impact the demographic balance in the province.
Another example is that there is no working group on CPEC at the provincial level that could protect the interests of Balochistan. Such a group could have provided valuable inputs for decisions being made ostensibly in the interests of the people.19 A prime example of how the Baloch are being ignored is the fact that the chairman of the parliamentary committee for CPEC is a Punjabi senator, Mushahid Hussain, whereas the appointment of a Baloch would have done much to assuage the feelings of the Baloch.20
Addressing a meeting in Quetta in September 2015, Balochistan National Party (BNP) president and former chief minister Sardar Akhtar Mengal said: ‘We have researched and thoroughly read every agreement inked in recent years regarding “Gwadar–Kashgar Economic Corridor”, but found nothing for Balochistan. All they are doing is build a modern Punjab and equip it with all facilities and boost its economy.’21 In another interview in May 2017 Mengal said, ‘Take my word for it, CPEC will turn out to be no different than the East India Company. The Chinese, with their huge population and all, will make Pakistan look not like a country but China Town.’22
In an interview to The Friday Times in March 2015, the veteran Baloch nationalist Mir Mohammad Ali Talpur summed up the Baloch position on the CPEC: ‘They [Punjab] do not understand the Baloch people’s sentiments. If the prosperity of Pakistan is essential, so are the sentiments of the people who live there. We are not against prosperity. We are against exploitation. We want our rights. Development will follow.’23
The worst of Baloch fears were confirmed in a report of the Federation of Pakistan Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FPCCI). It stated that given the current rate of influx of Chinese nationals into Balochistan, the local population of the area will be outnumbered by 2048. The report acknowledged that the most important apprehension of the people of Balochistan relates to change in demography. Extrapolating from the existing rate of migration from China at 0.44 persons per thousand and Baloch rate of population growth, the report predicted that the share of the Chinese in Balochistan’s population would increase with the completion of the CPEC, and by 2048 Chinese population could be greater than that of Pakistanis.24
Likewise during a seminar on the CPEC in Lahore, the point-person for the project in the Nawaz Sharif government, Ahsan Iqbal, categorically disclosed that without China’s permission no agreement on the CPEC, including Gwadar, could be made public or even shared with the government of Balochistan. This statement amply demonstrated what lay in store for Balochistan.25
Meanwhile, some of the CPEC projects, including two in Balochistan, have run into trouble since China has stopped their funding at the time of writing. These include the Dera Ismail Khan–Zhob Road and Khuzdar–Basima Road. Both projects were portrayed as proof by the federal government that CPEC would benefit Balochistan. However, funding for these projects has been frozen until Beijing shares its new set of financing guidelines.
In the same context a seven-member delegation of senators, including four from Balochistan, visited China in the first week of December 2017: Dr Jehanzeb Jamaldini from the Balochistan National Party (BNP), Kabir Muhammad Shahi from the National Party (NP), Daud Achakzai from the Awami National Party (ANP) and Usman Kakar from Pashtunkhwa Milli Awami Party (PkMAP). Out of these four, Kabir Muhammad Shahi and Usman Kakar belonged to the parties that were in the Government of Balochistan as well as at the Centre. On return, all these senators unequivocally stated that Balochistan was not going to get anything from the CPEC. It was significant that both the government and opposition in Balochistan were in agreement that the impoverished province would not benefit from the CPEC.26
Dr Jehanzeb Jamaldini said: ‘It has been four years since the CPEC agreement was signed and even now the people of Gwadar don’t have drinking water. It’s quite clear that no tangible efforts have been made to resolve this issue.’ Senator Kabir Muhammad Shahi said that all highway construction projects in Balochistan that were being given the name of CPEC were originally commenced during the Musharraf era and they were routine projects. He lamented that he did not have any clue about the CPEC agreements despite being a member of the parliamentary committee on CPEC. ‘Why should I praise CPEC when I am not sure what the agreements entail for Balochistan?’27
In fact, in December 2018 even the Balochistan Chief Minister Jam Kamal Khan said, while chairing a meeting to review the progress of development projects under CPEC, that the provincial government was still ‘blind’ as to what exactly existed in the CPEC.28 As the Dawn put it, there was outrage in the Balochistan cabinet after it was revealed in a briefing of CPEC projects that no progress has been made in any projects outside Gwadar and that the overall portfolio of CPEC projects in the province was meagre. What was of special concern was that no progress has been made on projects that would connect the western route, a goal that was supposed to bring most benefits to the economy and was supposed to be the government’s top priority.29
Security Issues
The surge in economic activity has attracted new threats in a province that already has myriad security challenges. Apart from the Baloch insurgency, Balochistan has seen the rise of sectarian and Islamist militancy. With the expansion of the Chinese footprint in Pakistan where there are over 30,000 Chinese working,30 pre-existing threats could fuse with new strands of militancy to create an even greater threat. As the Dawn put it: ‘There is no realistic scenario in which Pakistan can wage a full-scale war against all those threats at the same time in the same province.’31
Security issues came to be highlighted from about 2004 when Chinese engineers and workers started being directly attacked. Three Chinese engineers were killed and nine injured in a car bomb blast in Gwadar in May 2004. The next month there were four serial blasts in the town but no casualties. A month later, three ‘home-made’ bombs exploded in the city, once again without causing any damage or casualty except for creating a sense of insecurity. A little later, three Chinese engineers were killed and eleven people, including two Pakistanis, were injured in Gwadar.32 In 2005 there were two sets of multiple bomb explosions within days of one another. Once again, there were no casualties or damage. In 2006 three Chinese engineers were shot dead in an ambush in Hub, Balochistan. In 2010 Chinese engineers had a narrow escape when there was a rocket attack from a boat off the coast on the Pearl Continental Hotel in Gwadar, where they were staying.33 In 2013 sever
al tankers carrying oil for Saindak project were attacked and partially damaged at Jorkain area of Noshki Balochistan. The tankers were on their way to supply oil for electricity generators and other machinery at Saindak gold and copper project in Chagai.34 In 2016 the Chinese government said it was ‘highly concerned’ after Allah Nazar Baloch, leader of the Balochistan Liberation Front (BLF), threatened to target CPEC projects and the several thousand Chinese nationals working on them.
On 11 August 2018 a bus carrying eighteen Chinese engineers escorted by Frontier Corps troops to the Dalbandin airport from the Saindak copper and gold mines was attacked on the Quetta–Taftan Highway by a suicide bomber. This was perhaps the first suicide attack by a Baloch nationalist. He tried to drive his explosives-laden vehicle into the bus. As a result, six persons including three Chinese engineers, two FC soldiers and the bus driver were injured. The Baloch Liberation Army (BLA) claimed responsibility saying it was carried out ‘… to warn China to vacate Balochistan and stop plundering its resources’. Jiand Baloch, a ‘spokesperson’ for BLA, stated, ‘We targeted this bus which was carrying Chinese engineers. We attacked them because they are extracting gold from our region, we won’t allow it.’ In a statement issued on Twitter the militant group identified the suicide bomber as Rehan Baloch, the elder son of BLA’s ‘senior commander’ Aslam Baloch. In his pre-recorded message, Rehan Baloch stated, ‘Through this act, I want to make China and its people realize [that] whosoever will try to meddle in Baloch issues without Baloch nation’s consent will face the wrath of Baloch nation.’35 In a significant development, different nationalist Baloch leaders and groups endorsed the suicide attack on the convoy of Chinese engineers.
On 23 November 2018 militants of the Baloch Liberation Army (BLA) attacked the Chinese consulate in Karachi. In the ensuing shoot-out, four people were killed—two policemen and two civilians. No Chinese nationals were hurt in the attack. The three attackers were also killed. The BLA later claimed responsibility for the attack in a tweet that included a photo of three attackers identified as Azal Khan Baloch, Razik Baloch and Rais Baloch.
The attack was the first time the Baloch insurgents directly attacked the Chinese diplomatic mission. It showed that the BLA had expanded its operations from Balochistan to Karachi and, most significantly, it used suicide-bombing methods for the operation. As important as this indicator was the potential that the unresolved conflict in Balochistan could have in causing tensions between China and Pakistan in case of additional attacks on Chinese interests.36
On 14 December 2018, less than a month after the attack on the Chinese consulate in Karachi, there was a joint attack by the three Baloch armed groups, the BLA, the Baloch Liberation Front and the Baloch Republican Guards, in Turbat district bordering Iran. At least six personnel of the Frontier Corps were killed. This attack in a mountainous region bordering Iran created tensions between the two countries.37
The Chinese are clearly aware of the dangers to their interests posed by the restiveness among the Baloch who have made no bones about targeting the Chinese. According to a report titled ‘China woos Pakistan militants to secure Belt and Road projects’, published on 19 February 2018, the Financial Times claimed that China had been in contact with ‘Pakistani tribal separatists’ for more than five years. The objective of the talks was to protect its investments in the China–Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC). The report cited three unnamed persons who had knowledge of these talks.38 Some support for the report was available from a statement of the Chinese ambassador to Pakistan Yao Jing who claimed in an interview to BBC Urdu on 2 February 2018 that the Baloch militant organizations were no longer a threat to the CPEC.39
On 22 February 2018, however, China rejected reports that it has been engaged in a dialogue with Baloch separatists to secure the CPEC project. China’s foreign ministry spokesperson when asked about such reports asserted, ‘I have never heard of such things as you mentioned.’40 On 23 February 2018 Pakistan also denied the reports that China was holding talks with Baloch insurgents to ensure the security of CPEC projects. According to the official spokesman, China was in ‘direct contact’ with Pakistan and ‘did not need to discuss security with Baloch leaders’.41 Likewise, Sher Muhammad Bugti, a representative of a separatist group the Baloch Republican Party, also denied having any negotiations with China.42
Nevertheless, what the Financial Times report did underline is the growing scepticism of the Chinese in Pakistan’s ability to handle the Balochistan insurgency, prompting them to undertake a direct outreach to the separatists. ‘This clearly reflects a weakness of the Pakistani government in bringing the Baloch to the negotiation table,’ writes Malik Siraj Akbar. He also makes the important point that the Chinese interest is primarily in the region around the Gwadar port. Here, the only group that has substantial influence is the Baloch Liberation Front led by Dr Allah Nazar Baloch.43
However, it wasn’t only in Balochistan that Chinese engineers and civilians were being targeted. They were attacked in different parts of Pakistan, which made the security of Chinese citizens one of the primary concerns of the Chinese government in their negotiations with Pakistani authorities. On 9 October 2004 two Chinese engineers were kidnapped while working at the Gomal Zam dam project in the South Waziristan Agency where a large-scale Pakistani military operation was underway against al-Qaeda fighters. The kidnapping led to a rescue operation that left one of the engineers dead, while the mastermind, former Guantanamo Bay inmate Abdullah Mehsud, remained at large. While Beijing vowed that such incidents will not deter it from engaging in development projects, work on the dam project was suspended.
In May 2016 a low-intensity bomb injured a Chinese engineer in Karachi. The Sindhudesh Revolutionary Party claimed responsibility and, in a pamphlet recovered from the blast site denounced CPEC as an ‘anti-Sindh project’. It also accused China of ‘looting Sindh’s resources’. In February 2018 a forty-six-year-old Chinese executive was killed in Karachi after an unknown gunman fired on his car. He worked for Cosco Shipping Lines Pakistan, a company unconnected with CPEC.44
Groups like Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), al-Qaeda and IS have all threatened to target Chinese nationals as a warning to China over its treatment of Muslims. A TTP faction claimed responsibility in March 2012 for the killing of a Chinese woman in Peshawar in retaliation for China’s killing of Uighur Muslims in Xinjiang.45 In a video released in March 2017 IS vowed to ‘… shed blood like rivers’ in attacks on Chinese nationals in order to avenge Beijing’s treatment of Uighurs. It followed up on that threat by kidnapping two Chinese language teachers from the supposedly secure zone in Quetta on 24 May 2017. They were subsequently killed.
The incident raised disturbing questions since it came a week after the security forces had conducted an operation against the IS–Lashkar-e-Jhangvi nexus in Splinji, Mastung, as part of Operation Raddul Fasaad. According to reports, several top commanders of the IS from different parts of the country, who had assembled in the Mastung area, were killed. This revealed the unpleasant truth that the IS was not a peripheral threat, and that the militancy in Balochistan was not limited to the nationalists alone.46 As China steps up its repressive policies in Xinjiang, more attacks on its nationals and projects in Pakistan are possible.
In October 2017 the Chinese embassy in Pakistan requested additional security for its ambassador in the wake of information that he was likely to be attacked. The embassy named one Abdul Wali belonging to the banned East Turkestan Independence Movement (ETIM), an extremist group operating in Xinjiang.47 For the ETIM, it may be easier to target Chinese interests in Pakistan than in Xinjiang where security is very tight. In December 2017 the Chinese embassy in Islamabad warned its citizens in Pakistan to be on alert after receiving intelligence reports about a ‘series of terror attacks’ targeting the Chinese. It urged its citizens to stay inside and avoid crowded places.48
In the light of the growing threat, Pakistan announced the setting up of a 12,000-strong force called ‘Special
Security Division (SSD)’, comprising both civilian and military personnel which would be led by an officer of the rank of a Lt. General. The mandate of the force was to provide protection to the entire CPEC. The security plan was later expanded by making it a four-layered plan in which some 32,000 security personnel (including the SSD) would guard the Chinese working in different capacities on projects in Pakistan. The force would include over 500 Chinese security personnel as well. On a visit to the SSD on 19 February 2016, former army chief Gen. Raheel Sharif stated, ‘The military is ready to pay any price to turn this ambitious project into reality.’49
An ominous aspect of this four-layered plan was the repercussion it would have on residents of Gwadar, whose worst fears regarding Chinese involvement in the port project could well be coming true. The plan involves issuing of residence cards to local inhabitants, and all outsiders coming into the city would be registered at entry points with records of outsiders maintained and updated regularly. The Chinese are apparently pushing for a sixty-five-mile fence around the whole town, with a special permit required for anyone—including locals—to enter, according to Pakistani and Chinese officials. Gwadar, in effect, would become a separate enclave limited for the Chinese with special rules and regulations. The Pakistanis, however, believe they can provide sufficient security without a fence.50
Apart from the Special Security Division, the Pakistan Navy has allocated a special marine battalion at the Gwadar port for surveillance. These marines will safeguard sea links used for communication and provide protection to ships entering and exiting the port in the
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