The bodies of nine bus passengers who were kidnapped and killed in Balochistan’s Sardhaka area last night were recovered and transported to their hometowns in Punjab on Friday morning, officials said.
On Thursday night, at least nine passengers travelling on two Punjab-bound coaches were abducted and killed by unidentified armed men in the Sur-Dakai area, situated on the border between Balochistan’s Zhob and Loralai districts, Assistant Commissioner Naveed Alam said a day ago.
Provincial government spokesperson Shahid Rind also confirmed the incident and said that Fitna-al-Hindustan — a term the government uses for terrorist organisations in Balochistan — had carried out attacks at three different places — Kakat, Mastung, and Sur-Dakai.
The Balochistan Liberation Front, a banned outfit, later claimed responsibility for the attack. A spokesman for the group said it had killed the nine individuals after blocking the highway between Musakhail-Makhtar and Khajuri.
Alam told Dawn.com on Friday that the bodies of all nine passengers were handed over to a political agent in the Sakhi Sarwar district of Dera Ghazi Khan to be handed over to their families.
He said that seven of the passengers had been identified but two could not be identified due to a lack of documents.
“The terrorists must have taken the passengers’ identification documents with them,” AC Alam said.
Of the seven passengers identified, two were residents of Lodhran, while one passenger each were residents of Dera Ghazi Khan, Gujrat, Attock, Khanewal and Gujranwala.
The country’s top leaders strongly condemned the incident and vowed action against the perpetrators “at all costs”.
In a statement today, President Asif Ali Zardari said: “This barbarity is part of Fitna-al-Hindustan’s evil conspiracy to spill blood in Pakistan,” state-run Radio Pakistan reported.
He reaffirmed commitment to “clear the land of Fitna-al-Hindustan and its facilitators at all costs”.
Similarly, Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif said in a statement issued by his office: “We will deal with terrorists with full force. The blood of innocent people will be avenged.”
The premier added that the killing of unarmed civilians was a blatant act of terrorism by Fitna-al-Hindustan.
“With resolve, unity, and strength, we will confront the scourge of terrorism and uproot it completely,” the prime minister said.
Balochistan Chief Minister Sarfraz Bugti also strongly condemned the incident, calling it “blatant terrorism”.
“The killing of innocent civilians based on Pakistani identity is an unforgivable crime,” Bugti said, vowing that the response would be “severe”.
“The terrorists have proven that they are not human beings, but cowardly beasts,” he said, adding that the state “would not even let these murderers hide underground.”
The chief minister added: “All networks of terrorists who are the sponsors of Fitna-al-Hindustan will be destroyed.”
Noting that this was a “state war”, he vowed decisive action.
CM Bugti further vowed to crush “every plan of terrorism” with strength, determination and unity. “Balochistan will become a graveyard for enemies.”
According to sources, two passenger coaches en route to Punjab were intercepted in the Sur-Dakai area near the N-70 highway, close to Dab — a place along the Loralai-Zhob border. A group of armed men had blocked the road and stopped the two vehicles.
The armed assailants boarded the coaches, checked the identity cards of passengers and forced 10 persons off the vehicles at gunpoint.
“They dragged out 10 passengers — seven from one coach and three from the other — and took them away (to an unknown place),” a surviving passenger told Levies. “I don’t know what they did to them, but I heard gunfire as we were leaving.”
After abducting the nine passengers, the assailants allowed both coaches to leave the area.
Security forces suspended traffic on the highway and began a large-scale search operation to locate the perpetrators.
According to sources, the attackers checked the national identity cards of all passengers and specifically targeted individuals with Punjab addresses. They also opened fire on the coaches during the abduction to prevent any escape.
In May this year, the government designated all terrorist organisations in Balochistan as Fitna-al-Hindustan.
Balochistan has witnessed a spate of attacks targeting those hailing from Punjab. In two separate incidents in April 2024, nine people were killed after being forced off a bus near Noshki, while two labourers from Punjab were shot in Kech.
In February, seven Punjab-bound passengers were offloaded from a bus and shot dead in Barkhan district. The incident came days after 12 were killed in a blast targeting a bus carrying coal miners in Harnai.
In May last year, seven barbers from Punjab were shot dead near Gwadar, while August saw 23 travellers offloaded from trucks and buses and shot in the Musakhail district.
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