Pakistani separatists storm Chinese consulate in Karachi

KARACHI, Pakistan (AP) – Armed separatists stormed the Chinese consulate in Karachi, a port city in southern Pakistan, on Friday, sparking an hour – long gun battle in which two police officers and police officers were killed. Three attackers were killed, Pakistani officials said.

The indiscriminate assault, claimed by a militant group in the southwestern Baluchistan province, reflected the separatists' attempt to interfere in Pakistan's close ties with China's main ally, China, which has heavily invested in road and transport projects in the country, including Baluchistan.

All diplomats and Chinese staff at the consulate are safe and have not suffered any prejudice during the attack or shootings, said a senior police official, Ameer Ahmad Sheikh.

Prime Minister Imran Khan condemned the attack, describing it as part of a plot against economic and strategic cooperation between Pakistan and China. Khan praised the Karachi police and paramilitary rangers, saying that they had shown exceptional courage in defending the consulate and that the "nation pays tribute to the martyrs".

He ordered an investigation and promised that such incidents could never undermine relations with China, which are "more powerful than the Himalayas and deeper than the sea of ​​Arabia".

The attackers stormed the consulate shortly after 9:00 am during office hours. They first opened fire on the consulate guards and threw grenades, then managed to cross the main gate and enter the building, said Mohammad Ashfaq, a local police chief.

Pakistani security forces quickly surrounded the area. Local television broadcast footage of the smoke rising from the building, which also serves as a residence for Chinese diplomats and other staff members.

Several explosions were heard soon after, but Sheikh could not say what they were. The shooting lasted about an hour.

"Because of the rapid reaction of the guards and the police, the terrorists have not been able to reach the diplomats," said Sheikh after the fighting ended. "We have finished the operation and a search is still underway to find and capture all the suspects."

He added that one of the attackers was wearing a safety vest and that the authorities were trying to identify the attackers by means of fingerprints.

Seemi Jamali, spokesman for Jinnah Hospital, said the bodies of two police officers had been transported to the hospital morgue while one of the injured consulate guards was in course of treatment.

Elsewhere in Pakistan, a powerful bomb fell on an open-air food market in the Orakzai region of Khyber Pukhtunkhwa province, which borders Afghanistan, killing 12 people and at least 50 injured, said a police official, Tahir Ali.

Most of the victims of the attack in the city of Klaya were Muslims belonging to the Shia minority. Nobody immediately claimed responsibility for the bombing. Orakzai has been the scene of several militant attacks in recent years, mostly by Sunni Pakistani militants.

In her claim for responsibility for the Karachi consulate's attack, the Baluch Liberation Army declared that she was fighting "Chinese occupation" and published photos of the three assailants .

This was the second attack this year by Baloch separatists in Pakistan. Karachi, the capital of Sindh province on the Baluchistan border, has several militant groups, including Baluch separatists.

In August, a suicide bomber hit a bus carrying Chinese workers to the Saindak mining project in southwestern Baluchistan, injuring five workers. The project is controlled by the Chinese company Metallurgical Corporation, owned by the Chinese state. And in May, gunmen opened fire on two Chinese nationals in Karachi, killing one of them and wounding each other.

Friday 's attack was a sharp rise in violence perpetrated by the Baloch separatist, said Amir Rana, executive director of the Pakistan Independent Institute of Peace Studies.

So far this year, the Baluch Liberation Army has claimed 12 attacks against security personnel overseeing projects related to the "economic corridor between Pakistan and China" and to the infrastructure.

In a letter dated August 15, the group issued a letter warning China against "the exploitation of Baluchistan's mineral wealth and the occupation of Baluchi territory". The letter was addressed to the Chinese Ambassador to Pakistan.

But, according to Rana, China and Pakistan have both calculated the security risks, including the threats made by the Baloch separatist.

"I do not see that this will have an impact on the Chinese projects in Pakistan, these threats were already visible on the threat radar of Pakistan and China," he said.

China is a long-time ally and has invested heavily in transport projects in Pakistan. The two countries have strengthened their ties in recent years and China is currently building a network of roads and power plants as part of a project called the Sino-Pakistan Economic Corridor, or CPEC.

The Baluchistan separatists have been fighting a low-intensity insurgency in Pakistan for years, demanding a greater share of the province's wealth and natural resources.

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Associated press editors Munir Ahmed and Kathy Gannon in Islamabad and Riaz Khan in Peshawar, Pakistan contributed to this report.