Flags were at half-mast in Balochistan on all government buildings yesterday, but against what? While the attack on the former residency of Quaid-e-Azam at Ziarat was claimed by the Baloch Liberation Army (BLA), and government officials had no qualms sending warning the way of nationalists, no warnings were issued to the claimant of the bus attack followed by a hostage situation which left 25 dead at the Bolan Medical Complex in Quetta, the Laskhkar-e-Jhangvi (LeJ). The attack on Jinnah’s former residency in Ziarat may have been a senseless bombing of a national symbol, the attack on female students was far more serious and involved a female suicide bomber on board the bus and was followed up by a militant holdout at the hospital complex. The situation in Balochistan has been considered out of control for a while but the silence of both the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) and National Party (NP) leadership, now laying claim to the federal and provincial thrones respectively, against the LeJ borders upon criminal.

With at least 25 killed in the deadly assault on a Sardar Bahadur Khan Women’s University bus, located close to the Shiite Hazara neighborhood in Quetta with many Hazara students, the attack was a continuation of the spate of killings which led to the imposition of governor rule in Balochistan in January 2013. An LeJ spokesman, Abubakar Siddiq, called newspaper offices in Quetta late Saturday to claim the killings. Siddiq said, “The suicide attack on the bus was carried out by one of our sisters. She boarded the student bus and blew herself up. Then we carried out a second suicide attack at the hospital and our fighters killed several people. We did this because security forces killed our fighters and their wives in Kharotabad.” The raid by security forces on June 6 on a militant hideout in Kharotabad, in which at least three militants and two women were killed, went unnoticed on the national media and for a long time fingers kept pointing towards the nationalists for conducting both attacks.

However, despite the situation clearing up and it becoming clear that these were two different transgressors, Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar did not put the responsibility on any organisation or group while Information Minister Pervez Rashid “warned Baloch youth against taking up arms” and pointed to “local elements”, which could mean anything. With one of the BMC attackers reportedly arrested some key details may come forth but it is high time that the PML-N government paid heed to Baloch sentiments. Why is it feigning ignorance of the threat posed by the LeJ, thought to be close to the security establishment? And why did the PML-N leaders Sanaullah Zehri and Pervez Rashid remind Balochistan Chief Minister Dr Abdul Malik again that “despite having a majority, we, the PML-N, invited the nationalists to form the government”? Dr Malik himself is struggling for credibility from Baloch nationalists, and if the federal government continues to undermine him, the situation may only get worse.