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Iraq's shadow on
Balochistan
By B Raman
The
widely anticipated United States-United Kingdom invasion
of Iraq is already casting its shadow on the
Balochi-inhabited areas on both sides of the
Pakistan-Iran border.
Immediately after the
liberation of Bangladesh in 1971, large sections of the
Balochi tribals led by Khair Bux Marri, the leader of
the Marri tribe, and Sardar Ataullah Khan Mengal, the
leader of the Mengal tribe, rose in revolt against the
Punjabi domination of Pakistan and demanded the creation
of an independent Balochistan consisting of the
Balochi-inhabited areas of Pakistan and Iran.
Among their grievances against Islamabad were:
neglect of the economic development of the area;
discrimination against the Balochis in respect of
recruitment to the civilian government services and the
armed forces; the policy of resettlement of large
numbers of Punjabi and Pashtun ex-servicemen in
Balochistan, which was viewed by them as an attempt to
reduce the Balochis to a minority in their homeland; and
non-payment of royalties to the Balochi tribals for the
utilization of their natural resources for the benefit
of the rest of Pakistan.
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And Balochistan, a huge
land rich in oil and gas resources and with a
small population spread in Afghanistan, Iran and
Pakistan, could become a new focal point in
regional and international
disputes.
Balochistan tribes threaten Pakistan's
gas riches
Asia Times
Online
July 25,
2002
| The regime of the late
Zulfiquar Ali Bhutto, the then prime minister,
ruthlessly suppressed the revolt by using its air force
and with the cooperation of the regime of the Shah of
Iran. Some tribals, however, did not join the revolt and
collaborated with the regime in suppressing their
co-tribals. Among the tribals who collaborated with the
government and the Pakistani military-intelligence
establishment were the Jamalis, led by the family of Mir
Zafarullah Khan Jamali, the present premier of Pakistan.
After the suppression of the revolt, Khair Bux
Marri and his supporters took shelter in Afghanistan,
along with some sections of the Mengals. Ataullah Khan
Mengal himself sought sanctuary in the UK. They
established contact with the authorities of the
erstwhile USSR through the regime in Kabul and received
financial and logistics support from Moscow.
When
the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), through
Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), trained
and armed the Afghan mujahideen and other Islamic
fundamentalist elements and used them to bleed the
Soviet troops in Afghanistan, the Marris and the Mengals
kept away from the anti-Soviet jihad and helped the KGB,
the Soviet intelligence agency, and the Khad, the Afghan
intelligence agency, in the collection of intelligence
regarding the activities of the CIA and the ISI on the
Pakistani side of the border.
The Jamalis collaborated with the CIA and the ISI in
countering the activities of the Marris and the Mengals
and their Marxist influence in Balochistan. During the
course of this collaboration, Mir Zafarullah Khan Jamali
came in touch with Nancy Powell (no relation of General
Colin Powell, the US Secretary of State), who was
then a young member of the diplomatic corps in Pakistan and
who was posted last year by the Bush administration as
the US ambassador to Pakistan. Jamali and Nancy Powell
developed a close personal friendship, which has been
carefully nurtured by Washington DC. According to some
sections of the Pakistani media, it was she who
suggested to President General Pervez Musharraf, the
Pakistani military dictator, Jamali's name for
appointment as the prime minister after the elections of
October 10 last.
The CIA, in tandem with the
Iraqi intelligence, encouraged the Iranian Balochis who,
like their Pakistani counterparts, are largely Sunnis,
to rise in revolt against the Islamic regime in Teheran.
Among the Balochi tribals of Pakistan, who helped the
CIA and the Iraqi intelligence in fomenting the revolt
on the Iranian side of the border, were the Jamalis, the
Mazaris, the Bugtis and others. However, the Iranian
authorities had no difficulty in suppressing the revolt.
During this period, the Iraqi intelligence,
encouraged and helped by the CIA and the ISI, developed
considerable influence among the anti-Iran and
anti-Shi'ite tribals on both sides of the border. It
mostly acted through the anti-Tehran Mujahideen-e-Khalq,
a dissident group of Iran, and the Sunni extremist
Sipah-e-Sahaba, Pakistan (SSP). As a result of the
active past association of the Iraqi intelligence with
large sections of the Balochis, Iraq still retains
considerable sympathy and support in Balochistan.
Balochistan has
considerable strategic importance for the US for various reasons: Most of
Pakistan's oil and gas resources are located in
Balochistan and about 30 percent of these are controlled
by American oil companies, many of them from President
George W Bush's home state of Texas. It is an important
window on Iran. If the US decides to overthrow the
Iranian regime after getting rid of the Saddam Hussein
regime in Iraq, the pro-US Balochi tribes, particularly
the Jamalis, could be as useful to Washington DC as the
Kurds are expected to be against Saddam Hussein.
Balochistan is an escape route for the dregs of Osama
bin Laden's al-Qaeda and the International Islamic Front
(IIF) trying to get away by sea to Yemen.
For the same reasons, Balochistan has
become an important operational area for al-Qaeda and IIF remnants
in their attempts to hurt US economic interests in
Pakistan in retaliation for the US war against the
Taliban and al-Qaeda in Afghanistan and its campaign
against the Saddam regime. They have been receiving
assistance in their endeavors from the pro-Iraqi and
anti-US segments of the Balochi tribals on both sides of
the Pakistan-Iran border.
Since December last, there have
been at least four attacks on the oil and gas
infrastructure in Balochistan by unidentified elements.
Available particulars of three of these incidents are
given below:
A powerful
explosion on December 2, 2002, damaged a 26-inch gas pipeline of the
Oil and Gas Development Corporation Limited (OGDCL) near
Uch in Balochistan and disrupted gas supplies to the
US-sponsored 580 MW Uch power plant. After the initial
investigations, the company termed the incident a
sabotage activity. "It is suspected that elements
opposed to the stability of Pakistan have carried out
yet another act of sabotage, disrupting gas supplies to
a foreign power generation plant, and thwarting the
efforts for economic recovery of the government and the
OGDCL at the same time," a company spokesman said.
Two main gas pipelines
connecting Pakistan's gas transmission system with the
Sui gas field in Balochistan were ruptured after a gas
station was blown up by unidentified elements, either
with a powerful bomb or rockets fired from a distance,
on January 21, 2003. As a result, the Sui Northern Gas
Pipelines Limited (SNGPL) closed down/curtailed gas
supply to the textile, steel, paper, soap, ceramics and
other industries in the Punjab and the North West
Frontier Province (NWFP). There was also an attempt to
blow up the pipeline supplying water to the gas industry
in the area. Before this incident, electricity supply
was disrupted when unidentified elements pulled out 20
electricity poles and electrical wire from 300 poles in
Goth Mazari, disconnecting electricity supply to Dera
Bugti and Sui in Balochistan.
On January 22, 2003, another gas pipeline in the Sui
area of Balochistan was blown up by unidentified
elements, partially cutting off the gas supply to some
areas of Sindh and Balochistan.
The
Pakistani authorities
have tried to play down the seriousness of
the attacks and to project them as due to differences
between the Mazari and the Bugti tribes over their
respective share of the royalties paid by the companies to
the tribes in whose territory the gas infrastructure is
located.
Commenting on the incidents, an
editorial in the News, the prestigious Pakistani daily,
said on January 23, "It may only be a coincidence that
the terrorists struck when Prime Minister Mir Zafarullah
Khan Jamali and American ambassador Nancy Powell were
meeting in Quetta to re-stress the resolve to fight
terrorism. Ambassador Powell had also delivered hardware
to the Frontier Corps for the protection of the western
border. Nonetheless, even if a coincidence, the latest
terrorist strike brings into stark relief the internal
insecurity that threatens vital national installations
at a time when much of the attention is focused on
fighting terrorists as defined by the USA."
B Raman is Additional Secretary (ret),
Cabinet Secretariat, Government of India, and presently
director, Institute For Topical Studies, Chennai; former
member of the National Security Advisory Board of the
Government of India. E-Mail: corde@vsnl.com. He was also
head of the counter-terrorism division of the Research
& Analysis Wing, India's external intelligence
agency, from 1988 to August, 1994.
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