ISLAMABAD: Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif on Friday vowed that the people of Balochistan would have the first right to benefit from the province’s “wealth”, adding that investment and resources would be required to extract metals and minerals from the region.
The premier was addressing the closing ceremony of the Balochistan National Workshop in Quetta, which was attended by senior government officials, local notables and religious leaders from the province.
“Today, if I were to say that Balochistan is Pakistan’s richest province, I wouldn’t be wrong. But our precious metals and minerals are still buried under mountains in massive quantities,” PM Shehbaz said.
“There should be no doubt that this is the wealth of the people of Balochistan, whether they are from Makran, Lasbela, Chaman or any other area,” he added.
Acknowledging that the people of Balochistan would have the first right to benefit, the premier said questions arose about whether the full benefits of the province’s metals and minerals could be extracted.
“To ensure that, we will need investment to extract that wealth from the mountains and waters,” he said. “We need expertise, we need the means.”
He further said that Balochistan and the federal government needed to work together to “bring this wealth to the people of Balochistan first, and then to the people of Pakistan”.
PM Shehbaz then discussed some of the challenges facing Balochistan, including the need for education, hospitals and roads, as well as the security situation.
“The biggest thing is that geographically, you are the largest province. If people need to head to different areas, if they need education, if hospitals and roads need to be built, then providing the means is a genuine challenge,” he said, noting that these issues were not unique to Balochistan.
“So how do we solve these issues? Through mutual consensus and the fair distribution of the available resources so that all provinces benefit,” the premier said. “If there are challenges, they need to be resolved through mutual dialogue.”
However, PM Shehbaz said that “no Pakistani” could try to solve problems by resorting to violence. He cited examples of people from elsewhere in the country who had come to Balochistan for work, but were captured by terrorists and killed based on their ethnicity or where they were from.
“As far as terrorism in Balochistan is concerned, there is no doubt Fitna al Khawarij are benefiting from hostile nations and martyring the innocent,” he said, using the term the state employs to designate terrorists.
“Security forces and law-enforcing agencies are fighting them day and night,” he added. “They have kept hundreds of millions of children safe at the expense of their lives. We must never forget this sacrifice.”
Earlier today, Chief of Defence Forces (CDF) and Chief of Army Staff Field Marshal Asim Munir said that foreign-sponsored proxies are being employed by hostile elements to destabilise Balochistan, obstruct its development and “create a wedge between the state and its people”.
According to Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR), he made the remarks while interacting with the political leadership of Balochistan.
It said that CDF Munir underscored that the “present and the future of Balochistan and Pakistan are one and forever”.
Balochistan possesses some of the world’s most promising undeveloped deposits of copper, gold, chromite, antimony and potentially rare earth elements.
The province is home to the world’s largest undeveloped copper deposits at Reko Diq. A $7 billion mining project is jointly owned by the government and Barrick Mining Corporation in equal shares. It is expected to begin production by the end of 2028.
According to the Pakistan Institute for Conflict and Security Studies’ (PICSS) monthly security assessment released on July 31, the security situation deteriorated most significantly in Balochistan in the country last month.
The overall death toll increased by 241pc in Balochistan, from 109 in June to 372 in July, the report said.
Security personnel deaths in Balochistan increased from six in June to 62 in July, representing a rise of 933pc. Terrorist deaths rose from 75 to 238, while civilian deaths increased by 93pc, from 28 to 54. Eighteen members of peace committees were also killed in the province.
