The survivors remember that the terrorists were armed with heavy weapons, passengers grouped based on their region of origin.
In the middle of the dead of the night, Muhammad Numan saw an opportunity. The three armed men protecting their Bogie were in a deep sleep. Quickly, he organized an escape plan. “It’s a bet of life and death … it’s now or never,” he convinced other passengers.
And so, the 30 -year -old, along with more than a dozen others aboard the Jaffar Express, slipped out of the train and towards the desert of the surrounding mountains. Behind them, they could listen to the shock. The shots sounded in all directions. But they didn’t look back. “We walked for four hours and stopped only when we reached a border body control point,” Numan said.
On March 11, the terrorists affiliated with the successful Liberation Army of Baluchistan (BL) attacked the Jaffar Express near the Mashkaf tunnel, about 157 kilometers from Quetta, and gave around 440 passengers as hostages. The kidnapping was the first of their kind, while the terrorists bombarded train tracks and tried to derail the trains before, they have never tried to take an entire train and their occupants as hostages.
Subsequently, the military began a recovery operation that culminated last night. In a press release, the military media wing said all hostages had been rescued while 33 terrorists involved in the attack were killed.
According to the Director General of Public Relations of Inter Services (ISPR), Lieutenant General Ahmed Sharif Chaudhry, the operation was carried out by the Army, the Air Force, the FC and the Group of Special Services. He added that 21 passengers were killed before the authorization operation began, while four FC personnel were martyred.
Face to face with death
Numan was one of the lucky passengers who came out of kidnapping. But most of his friends don’t. “Some 20 of us were working in Afghanistan in recent months and we decided to return home [to Gujranwala and Lahore] For a few weeks, ”he said Dawn.com.
Unfortunately, only three of them remained alive, others have been killed or remain missing. Some of them were even killed in front of Numan’s eyes. “After the train stopped, there was a shot. Then, the terrorists entered the bogies and began to verify the identity cards of all. “
“They threatened to kill us all if the government refused to meet their demands,” he recalled. “They [the terrorists] They were a large group, they had even taken positions in the mountains. ”
Muhammad Naveed, another passenger who managed to escape, said that the terrorists asked them to leave the train one by one. “They separated the women and asked them to leave. They also saved the elderly.
“They asked us to leave, saying that we will not be damaged. When around 185 people left, they chose the people and knocked them down. ”
Arslan Yousaf, one of the passengers who was escorted by security forces, recalled that the terrorists were armed with rocket launchers, weapons and other weapons. They grouped passengers on the basis of their region of origin, he said.
“Sometimes they took soldiers … and they executed them,” he said, referring to the passengers of the Pakistan army and other security forces that were traveling on the train. “Other times, they went to specific individuals. If they had resentment against someone, they shot him in the spot. ”
‘God saved me’
Muhammad Ashraf, 75, who was traveling to Lahore in Jaffar Express, he said Dawn.com That all passengers were in a state of pain. “Some of us lay on the floor face down.”
“They killed at least 10 people in an hour that included three members of the Railway Police personnel and as many police commands. The terrorists took their weapons, ”he recalled. Ashraf added that he was only allowed to go due to his old age.
“I went on foot and arrived at Paneer station after three hours, after which the FC staff took me other passengers to Mach on a relief train,” he said. They returned to Quetta last night.
“I saw Qiyamat And death very closely, but it was God who saved me and many other passengers despite the fact that they wanted to kill everyone, ”added Ashraf.
Babar Masih, a 38 -year -old Christian worker, underwent a similar experience. He and his family walked for hours through steep mountains to reach a train that could take them to an improvised hospital on a railway platform.
“Our women begged them and saved us,” he said. “They told us to leave and not look back. While we ran, I noticed many others running next to us. ”
The long wait
Last night at Quetta train station, the platforms were full of relatives who were waiting for their loved ones anxiously. All rescued hostages were being brought back.
Abdul Rauf, 30, was among those who expected. His eyes threw themselves from the tracks to the load trains, looking for a familiar face. It had spent the last two days at the station. “I said goodbye to my father on Tuesday … He was fine to attend the funeral of a nephew,” he said.
“In the last hours, I asked everyone about my father, but I did not get any information despite the 36 -hour pass,” he said, added that his father was not on the list of passengers who were going back that night.
“Where are the authorities? Who will listen to injured families who expect information about the whereabouts of their beloved? ”, He lamented. “We have served all our lives for this country, why is this happening to us?”
Additional AFP and Reuters
Image of heading: Train passengers sit on a bus after being released by armed terrorists who ambushed the train in the remote mountain area of the province of southwest Baluchistan, in Mach, on March 13, 2025. – AFP
