ISPR says terrorists have access to huge cache of US weapons left in Afghanistan
Army soldiers gather at the site following militant attacks in Quetta on January 31. Photo: Reuters
Dressed in military fatigues and with rifles slung over their shoulders, Yasma Baloch and her husband Waseem smile for the camera in a photo posted by Pakistani insurgents after their latest mission: detonating suicide bombers.
The Baloch Liberation Army (BLA) shared the heavily photoshopped photo sent to journalists and distributed it on social media.
It is among half a dozen photos and biographies that Reuters was not immediately able to verify, but which analysts see as part of a propaganda effort by terrorists in the resource-rich southwestern province to show the appeal of their movement.
Terrorist attacks in Balochistan hit a record last year, stoking risks to huge planned investments in the region, including Chinese and US interests.
Wider recruitment
The growing number of women is helping to boost recruitment, said Minister of State for Interior Talal Chaudhry. “It gives them popularity and reach, and it makes their community feel like the fight has come to their home,” Chaudhry said. Reuters. Pakistan has addressed the issue of online terrorist recruitment on many social media platforms, he added.
Three suicide bombers were among six women who took part in the group’s largest wave of attacks in January, which killed 58 people and nearly paralyzed the province, said Hamza Shafaat, a senior government official.
Prior to these attacks, records show a total of five BLA suicide bombers, with the first such attack taking place in 2022, while three other would-be suicide bombers were captured during counterterrorism operations in recent months.
“The broader appeal of the insurgency… now extends beyond male-dominated tribal and feudal leaders to include a wider segment of society,” said Pearl Pandya, senior South Asia analyst at conflict watcher ACLED.
Read: 37 terrorists killed, 10 security personnel martyred as attacks foiled in Balochistan
Weapons
The women’s participation amplifies a movement that Pakistan’s military says has bolstered its firepower through access to a huge cache of U.S. weapons left in Afghanistan after Washington’s withdrawal from the neighboring country in 2021.
Abdul Basit, an insurgency and militancy researcher at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore, cited the group’s use of drones to identify troop deployments and vulnerabilities, adding that it used satellite communication when hijacking a train in February 2025 with more than 400 people on board.
Pakistan recovered 272 American-made rifles and 33 night vision devices in June last year, according to the military, in addition to weapons seized in the latest Balochistan attacks.
The armed forces “continue to see these weapons in the hands of terrorists operating inside Pakistan,” military spokesman Lt. Gen. Ahmed Sharif Chaudhry said. Reuters before the January attacks.
The Pentagon did not respond to a request for comment.
In response to a request for comment, White House spokeswoman Anna Kelly said: “As President Trump said, Joe Biden’s botched withdrawal from Afghanistan was the most embarrassing day in our country’s history, which tragically resulted in the deaths of 13 U.S. service members and the loss of equipment to the Taliban. »
Learn more: The specter of terror in Balochistan
She added: “We do not discuss private conversations with foreign governments.”
In more than a dozen coordinated attacks in January, terrorists stormed hospitals, government buildings and markets, set off bombs and fired into crowds, killing 58 civilians and security officials.
A dangerous tactical evolution
Subsequently, among the 216 terrorists security forces said were killed during nearly a week of fighting, they seized items ranging from grenade launchers to more than a dozen M16 and M4 rifles.
Reuters was unable to verify whether the sophisticated weapons used in the BLA attacks were made in the United States or originated elsewhere.
Among the $7 billion in equipment remaining in Afghanistan, the U.S. Department of Defense said, Afghan forces received more than 300,000 weapons out of a total of 427,300. That’s in addition to more than 42,000 items such as night vision goggles and surveillance devices, it added.
And terrorists hope that propaganda about female recruits will strengthen their impact.
Also read: Security forces conclude operations after terror attacks in Balochistan
“They use women strategically in high-profile attacks to gain visibility,” Basit added.
The women come from diverse socio-economic backgrounds, some with university educations, Pakistan’s counterterrorism department said in a December report seen by Reuters.
“This change represents a dangerous evolution in terrorist tactics,” he says of women’s growing participation.
This change is due to psychological manipulation, online radicalization and strategic exploitation of vulnerable individuals, he adds. “The foot soldiers and leaders of the insurgency are now both middle-class,” said ACLED analyst Pandya.
