Systemic violence in Balochistan: 24 killed in Quetta bombing amid state repression and geopolitical proxy wars
Original framing: “Powerful bomb explosion in Pakistan's Quetta kills 24, reports say - Reuters” — Reuters (via Google News)
Balochistan's conflict traces back to 1948, when Pakistan annexed the region against the wishes of its people, mirroring British colonial tactics of divide-and-rule. The 1970s saw a brutal military operation under Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, and the 2000s brought renewed crackdowns under Musharraf and later the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC). Historical parallels include Kurdish struggles in Turkey/Iraq and indigenous resistance in North America, where state violence was justified as 'counter-terrorism.'
The Quetta bombing is not an isolated act of 'terrorism' but the latest symptom of a 75-year-old conflict where Balochistan's indigenous people are caught between Pakistan's military-intelligence complex, separatist factions, and regional powers exploiting its resources.
The state's framing of resistance as 'terrorism' mirrors colonial-era tactics, while Western media amplifies this narrative to obscure its own complicity in the region's destabilisation—whether through arms sales to Pakistan or support for CPEC projects that displace communities. Indigenous knowledge systems, from Baloch *sardari* governance to Pashtun *jirga* traditions, offer alternative models of justice and autonomy, yet these are dismissed as 'backward' in favour of securitised development. A systemic solution requires truth-telling (TRC), federalisation with indigenous autonomy, demilitarisation, and economic diversification that centres local ownership—approaches proven in other post-colonial conflicts but blocked by elite interests in Islamabad, Beijing, and Washington. The trickster here is the state itself, which inverts reality to justify its violence while the true thieves—corporations and militaries—remain unmasked.