Hijacked, bombed, derailed, a Pakistani train keeps running

Quetta: The Jaffer Express is a 1,000-mile lifeline connecting Quetta, the capital of Balochistan province, and the other big cities of Pakistan.

But this railway line is also a regular target of armed separatist groups in Balochistan, who view it as a symbol of the Pakistani state — the state that they have been fighting against for decades. The train and railway infrastructure in Balochistan have faced at least 27 attacks in the past 18 months alone, according to railway officials.

On Feb. 13, I was caught in the middle of the 28th attack with Asim Hafeez, a photojournalist. Asim and I had come to the Quetta station for a journey on the Jaffer Express to speak to its passengers, who ride the line despite the risks.

Here are just a few of the recent attacks:

— On Jan. 27, less than two weeks before our trip, an explosion on the railway track derailed four of the train’s bogies.

— On Sept. 25, at least 12 people were injured by a bomb blast on the Jaffer Express. The Baloch Liberation Army, an armed separatist group, claimed responsibility for the attack.

— On March 11, 2025, the same group intercepted the train in a remote area of Balochistan, where the train snakes through tunnels and gorges. For 36 hours, the militants kept 440 passengers hostage. The standoff ended with the deaths of 33 militants, 26 passengers, and five security personnel.

— On Nov. 9, 2024, a suicide bomber attacked the Quetta Railway Station, killing over two dozen passengers waiting for the Jaffer Express. The BLA claimed responsibility.

As it happened, we never got on the train.

At about 8:20 a.m. on the day we arrived, gunfire shattered the Quetta station’s usual morning routine. Passengers and railway employees rushed into the waiting rooms and offices. Others froze, unsure whether to run or hide as shots echoed dangerously close.

Asim and I hid in a dark storage room with half a dozen bewildered employees. One worker feared that buggies carrying soldiers’ families from a military cantonment to the station had been ambushed a few hundred yards away.

The firing continued intermittently for 15 minutes. When it was over, we saw abandoned bundles of luggage scattered across the platform. Families huddled in the waiting room, stunned and staring through the windows, uncertain whether the train would depart.

Police and railway staff later said that the shooting was linked to a car-snatching gang rather than an insurgent attack. Still, many passengers had already decided to cancel their journeys and demand ticket refunds.

“It is insane to travel on it,” said Farid Tahir, a trader heading to Lahore, who canceled his trip. His family of four stood close beside him, visibly shaken. “What would happen in the remote areas with no mobile signal and no help?”

To safeguard the Jaffer Express, the government has installed cameras for track surveillance and stationed onboard paramilitary guards, while vehicles shadow the train wherever roads parallel the tracks.

The most perilous segment of the journey is a 150-mile stretch through the Bolan Pass, a remote corridor of British colonial-era tunnels, gorges and bridges, where the train slows to just 18 mph. The slow speed is a mechanical necessity, but leaves the train and its passengers dangerously exposed to attackers perched in the surrounding crags.

After the brief but intense chaos that morning, the train pulled into the platform under heightened security, flanked by paramilitary soldiers. Railway employees announced the train’s departure, about an hour behind schedule.

“We are not the government. We are just workers,” said Rana Safdar, 32, a carpenter, who was waiting to board at Quetta station so he could go home to his rural district in Punjab, a neighboring province.

Tens of thousands of migrant workers, including Safdar, earn their livelihoods in various parts of Balochistan, sending money back to their families in other parts of Pakistan.

The high volume of travelers from Punjab, Pakistan’s most populous and prosperous province, make the train a target for insurgents who accuse the Pakistani state — dominated, in their view, by Punjab’s political and military elite — of exploiting Balochistan’s resources while leaving it marginalized.

But Safdar said he can’t afford air travel, and traveling by car is just as dangerous. Militants patrolling the roads use checkpoints to single out and target travelers from Punjab.

“Yes, the train is risky. But what alternative do we have?” Safdar said. “Sometimes it is attacked, sometimes it stops for days or even months. Still, it keeps moving.”

Safdar boarded the train, and it left the station at 10 a.m.