Syed Fazl e Haider

THE military handling of Balochistan is pushing Baloch nationalists into the separatist camp. All the apparent `kill and dump` policy is achieving is to kill any possibility of reconciliation and dump any chance of peace.

The real problem lies in the mindset underpinning the approach to handling the Balochistan crisis the frame of mind created by the national security paradigm that gives the security and intelligence agencies a greater role. Only if this mindset is changed can the disgruntled youth of Balochistan be brought back into the national mainstream.

Balochistan has always remained on the country`s political periphery. Over-centralism, a unitary type of governance and the arbitrary nature of the decision-making process in Islamabad have alienated the young of Balochistan. A province, already at the receiving end, is now receiving the bullet-riddled bodies of its people. The `mysterious kidnappings of political activists and extra-judicial killings are only fanning anti-federation flames.

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OF late in a retaliatory mood, Pakistan has been playing the ‘no more’ song to Washington’s ‘do more’ mantra. After blocking Nato supply lines through its territory and getting the Shamsi airbase vacated, Pakistan has mulled barring US aircraft from using its airspace.

After 10 years of the US-led war on terror Islamabad is seriously considering revisiting its national security paradigm. This period of a decade has been replete with incidents that have constituted a breach of Pakistan’s sovereignty including last November’s deadly Nato attack on Pakistani military outposts that killed 24 Pakistani soldiers. Islamabad in retaliation cut Nato supply lines, boycotted the Bonn conference on Afghanistan and ordered the US to vacate the Shamsi airbase. This is for the first time in 10 years that the country reacted to such an attack so vehemently.

There is so much fuss about the violation of sovereignty today. But the fact is that Pakistan itself allowed the US to violate the country’s sovereignty under covert and clandestine ‘deals’ and ‘understandings’ regarding the security situation after 9/11.

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REKO Diq, a world-class copper and gold mine in district Chagai of Balochistan estimated at a value of between $250bn to $500bn, is a commercially mouth-watering prospect for international mining giants.

American, Chinese, Australian, Chilean and Canadian firms have been in the race for wining a mining lease contract for the Reko Diq project. Will international interest in Balochistan’s huge copper deposits push the province to an era of copper politics? Chagai has huge copper-gold deposits at Saindak and Reko Diq. Will it be the next Chile that witnessed an era of copper politics under socialist president Salvador Allende?

Copper politics involves corporate greed and shenanigans to activate state actors in tug-of war games. There are indications that copper politics is brewing in Balochistan. Chagai is poised to appear soon on the world’s copper-producing map after it first attracted the world’s attention in May 1998 when Pakistan conducted nuclear tests.

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THE latest developments on the Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India (TAPI) and the Iran-Pakistan (IP) gas pipeline projects are such that it may shape into an either-or situation.

While work on the IP pipeline is expected to be completed ahead of schedule, the United States-backed TAPI project has also been expedited. Pipeline politics appear to have come into play. At the moment, the US is in favour of TAPI, Russia and China for IP, India is in a ‘wait and see’ mode and Pakistan seems to be running with the hare and hunting with the hounds.

Pakistan and Turkmenistan recently reached a deal on a gas sale-purchase price for the $7.6bn TAPI pipeline project, scheduled to be completed by 2016. Under the deal, Turkmenistan will deliver 1.3 billion cubic feet a day of gas at 69 per cent of the crude oil parity price, which is much lower than the gas rate of 78 per cent of crude price Islamabad agreed to with Tehran under the IP gas pipeline deal.

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The recent surge in target killings of Hazara community is apparently an attempt to subvert the move for building Iran-Pakistan and Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India energy pipelines.

Currently, Islamabad and Tehran are undertaking their gas pipeline project despite the US opposition and without India’s participation.

The attacks on Hazara community have been stepped up since Islamabad and Tehran committed to expedite efforts to implement the $7.5 billion IP gas pipeline project, the  greater part of which will traverse the restive Balochistan province. In the latest sectarian attack this month, at least 14 Hazara people were dragged out from a bus, lined up and shot dead in Quetta.

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