Karachi airport attack result of resentment of Pakistani people against Chinese BRI projects

The targeted attack on a convoy of vehicles carrying Chinese workers near Karachi International Airport by Baloch National Army militants on Monday evening that killed two Chinese nationals and injured another has once again underscored the deep resentment of the people of Pakistan against Belt and Road Initiative projects of China which have not helped common Pakistani people in any way. Rather, under the plea of ensuring security for Chinese engineers and workers engaged in the China Pakistan Economic Corridor, Pakistani security agencies and their Chinese advisors have unleashed a reign of terror on the common people of Pakistan.

The Chinese nationals working at the Port Qasim Electric Power Company on the outskirts of Karachi were returning home when the attack took place. A convoy of vehicles was carrying about 25 Chinese engineers and workers. At main traffic signal near Karachi airport a small vehicle packed with explosives was driven into the convoy by a suicide bomber.

With this attack, at least 23 Chinese nationals have died in different incidents of terror attacks in Pakistan since 2018. Some of the worst attacks have taken place in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province in north-west Pakistan, but in Karachi too there have been attacks on Chinese nationals.

Beijing has demanded of Islamabad that all security loopholes be effectively closed and targeted measures be taken to provide full protection to Chinese workers engaged in China Pakistan Economic Corridor projects.

Pakistani authorities are leaving no stone unturned to ensure the security of Chinese nationals; sacrificing the interests of the common people of Pakistan for this. In their anxiety to protect the Chinese masters and their interests, they have pushed things to a ludicrous extent. On September 9 last hundreds of policemen in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa blocked the Indus Highway connecting Peshawar with Karachi in protest against army excesses in the province. They wanted the Pakistani army and intelligence agencies to leave the province. The policemen accused the Inter Service Intelligence of Pakistan of exacerbating the threat in the province and unleashing a reign of terror.

Common Pakistani people are suffering immensely because of the anxiety of the Pakistani authorities to provide “fool-proof security” to Chinese nationals, says a Voice of America report. A dedicated military division and special provincial police units provide security to Chinese nations and projects in Pakistan. Chinese nationals move in bullet-proof vehicles with police escort. One percent of the cost of any project involving Chinese workers is budgeted for security. Common Pakistani people are denied access to sites of large projects, secured with barbed wires and cameras. Security checks are carried out on roads near where Chinese workers live or work. At the port city of Gwadar, hundreds of cameras keep surveillance on local residents as guards keep an eye from watch-towers.

In places where the Pakistani military controls security impoverished people have staged mass protests, complaining of lack of involvement in development projects funded by the Chinese, loss of livelihood and limited mobility. Shops and road-side restaurants close along when the Chinese travel from the port to the airport, two to three times in a week. In the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, residents have experienced mass displacement and destruction of infrastructure in the wake of a nation-wide anti-terror campaign carried out by Pakistan at the behest of China.

The Baloch Liberation Army which has claimed responsibility for the Karachi airport attack has accused China and Islamabad of exploiting the resource-rich province.

There are genuine grievances among the people of Pakistan against Chinese projects. From awarding contracts to companies for the execution of projects to the employment of workers in them, Pakistanis are being discriminated against and the Chinese favoured. Besides, some of the thermal power projects under the CPEC are highly polluting, like the one at Port Qasim. A Boston University study has found that the Port Qasim power plant exposes over 400,000 people to additional pollutants. The Port Qasim coastal area has been found to have high concentrations of chemicals harmful to marine life. Local people have called the power plant “dirty energy,” complaining of bad air quality, deteriorating ground water and impacts on agriculture.

The strategically important Karakoram Highway is another instance of Chinese high-handedness. Lately, Islamabad has relaxed building rules to directly award to China the contract amounting to $2 billion for the construction of the.

The Public Procurement Regulatory Authority law binds the Pakistan government to award contracts through competitive bidding. Lately, a special rule has been invoked by Finance Minister of Pakistan Muhammad Aurangzeb to exempt the requirement for international competitive bidding to award a contract to Chinese firms for the construction of a section of the Karakoram Highway. Now Chinese companies will be responsible for the engineering design, procurement, construction and supervision of work for this section of the highway.

The cross-border trade between Pakistan and China through the Karakoram Highway has, however, been wholly in favour of China; 96 percent of it is exports from China to Pakistan and four percent imports from Pakistan to China.

Crossing all limits of sycophancy, Prime Minister of Pakistan Shebaz Sharif while addressing a Pakistan – China Business Forum in Beijing earlier this year had promised that Chinese workers would be given more security in Pakistan than Pakistani children were given. “I will spare no effort to protect the lives of Chinese workers and assure and guarantee that we will provide them security more than our children,” he had said.

China is not impressed, however, with all the procrastinations of the Pakistani Prime Minister. Beijing wants Islamabad to carry out a large-scale anti-terror operation, something like the two-year-long Operation Zarb-e-Azb launched by Pakistani forces in 2014 which had cost the Pakistani army the lives of around 300 soldiers and $1.9 billion.

China is backing the counter-terrorism operations in Pakistan physically; helping Pakistan in the establishment of a Special Protection Unit and has also promised equipment for it. In the last week of August, Commander of the Ground Forces of the Chinese army General Li Qiaoming visited Pakistan to assess the security situation; especially the security of the CPEC projects, involving a total investment of $60 billion.

According to reports from Beijing, China plans to train 3,000 foreign law enforcement officials from countries like Pakistan and those in Africa to protect Chinese interests beyond its borders.

Under the plan, China will also send police consultants and working units to countries to help improve their law enforcement capacity, conduct joint patrols and investigations. All these amount to Chinese interference in the sovereignty of Pakistan.