Were six soldiers blown up over bustards in Balochistan on Christmas Day?

Balochistan is hardly a hotbed of violent animal advocacy,  but Qatari bustard hunters are deeply resented

TURBAT,  Pakistan––A vehicle carrying six armed guards for members of the Qatari royal family on an expedition to hunt houbara bustards,  an internationally recognized threatened member of the grouse family,  was blown up by a remote-controlled improvised bomb on Christmas Day near Turbat city,  Balochistan,  Pakistan.

The bombed vehicle is believed to have been the lead vehicle in a convoy traveling about 70 miles from the Iranian border.

Guards identified only as Zaman and Umer Zahoor were killed.  The injured were identified by local media as Naeem, Javed, Ameen, and Waheed,  also with no surnames given.

The Qatari royals under guard got away

None of the Qatari royal family hunters are known to have been hurt.

Agence France Presse reported that the hunters were “provided with ‘extra security’ after the blast,”  citing “senior local administration official Abdul Hameed” and an anonymous “second local administration official.

“Neither official said which members of the Qatari royal family––which numbers in the thousands––were in the hunting party,”  Agence France Presse added.

Was the bombing about the bustards?

Maybe.

Festering grievance

Animal advocacy has a low profile in Pakistan.  Violent actions on purported behalf of animals,  such as have occurred in the U.S. and Britain,  are unheard of.

Quatari recreational killing of houbara bustards,  however,  has long been a festering grievance of Pakistanis.

Houbara bustards,  small as bustards go but nonetheless among the biggest members of the grouse family,  have for half a century been favorite targets of falconers visiting Pakistan from the oil-rich Persian Gulf states,  just across the Sea of Oman,  an arm of the Arabian Sea.

“Stories about the high-rolling Arab falconers are legendary in Pakistan,”  summarized Jon Boone,  Karachi correspondent for The Guardian,  back in February 2014.

“Luxuriously appointed camps”

“Tons of equipment are flown in by private transport planes,  including the falcons used to hunt the rare quarry.  Luxuriously appointed camps are set up for the sheikhs and their guests,  who often stay for weeks,”  flaunting their wealth in one of the poorest parts of the world.

“Local communities value the money spent by their annual visitors,”  Boone wrote,  “who have paid for improvements to roads and airstrips,  as well as paying for the means to build mosques and schools.”

Despite that,  Boone acknowledged,  “Pakistan is witnessing a mounting backlash against Arab sheikhs who spend part of their winters hunting a rare bird that conservationists warn is at risk of extinction.”

Pakistanis are not allowed to hunt bustards

Hunting houbara bustards is considered offensive in itself by many Pakistani people.  Even those Pakistani people who are not offended by hunting,  when the prey is eaten,  are often offended by falconing,  in which the prey is typically killed just for entertainment.

Perhaps most offensive of all to Pakistanis is the perception that the nation and natural resources of Pakistan are treated as colonial possessions by falconers,  who customarily enjoy privileges that are not accorded to even affluent citizens of Pakistan.

Pakistanis,  for example,  are not allowed to hunt houbara bustards anywhere,  by any means,  period.

Reported incidents of resistance to Quatari houbara bustard hunters are rare,  but do occur.

Bustard hunting convoy was attacked in 2016

Qatari prince Fahad Abdul Rahman Al Thani,  for instance,  was evicted from an alleged falconing camp set in Tharparkar,  Sindh district, on February 10,  2017.

This came about six weeks after Zafar Baloch of The Express Tribune in Karachi reported that a convoy of houbara bustard hunters led by United Arab Emirates interior minister Sheikh Saif bin Zayed Al Nahyan was attacked by five armed men on motorcycles in Guchak area of Panjgur,  about 60 miles north of Turbat.

Two convoy vehicles escorting Sheikh Saif bin Zayed Al Nahyan were said to have been damaged.

The alleged assailants escaped without being identified.

(See Did the bastards kill any bustards? Oil sheik hunters evicted from Pakistan and Allowed to hunt rare bustards in Pakistan, Saudi prince kills 20 times the bag limit.)

Opposition to checkpoints

Turbat,  according to Wikipedia,  “is considered to be one of the main hubs of separatist insurgent groups active against Pakistani armed forces and development projects” sponsored by China.

“The city has also witnessed violence against non-local men who have either come for business or serving government officials from other parts of Pakistan mostly from the Punjab province,”  the Wikipedia entry hazily notes.

“The city holds many military checkpoints because of the security situation affected by the separatist insurgency.”

The checkpoints,  and the delays they cause travelers,  were the topic of heated debate in the Balochistan provincial assembly at Quetta on Christmas Eve,  the Pakistani newspaper Dawn reported.

One library,  with “about 100 books”

The nearby bombing of the Qatari bustard hunting convoy received little more media attention in Turbat,  a day afterward,  than the complaint of student activist Riaz Ghareeb,  of Askhani,  that “Currently,  there is only one public library in this major town of Balochistan,”  which “has just about 100 books.  The absence of libraries not only hinders academic progress but also limits opportunities for personal growth and development,”  Ghareeb wrote to local newspapers.

Despite that handicap to education,  especially female education,  the Sheikha Fatima Bint Mubarak Girls Cadet College in Turbat on December 26,  2024 graduated 64 female cadets,  headlined the Dunya News,  of Lahore in Punjub state.

“The college is not only providing quality education and training to girls,”   the Dunya News said,  “but also playing a significant role in the development and welfare of women in Balochistan.”

One might expect this challenge to tradition in deeply conservative Balochistan to attract more opposition than wealthy sheiks hunting bustards;  but it was the bustard-hunting convoy that was bombed.

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