Bodies of 21 hostages retrieved from Pakistan's train hijack

The bodies of at least 25 people, including 21 hostages, killed in a train siege by separatist gunmen in Pakistan were retrieved from the site on Thursday ahead of the first funerals, officials said.Security forces said they freed more than 340 train passengers in a two-day rescue operation that ended late on Wednesday after a separatist group bombed a remote railway track in mountainous southwest Balochistan and stormed a train with around 450 passengers on board.The assault was claimed by the Baloch Liberation Army (BLA), one of a number of separatist groups that accuse outsiders of plundering natural resources in Balochistan near the borders with Afghanistan and Iran.Death tolls have varied, with the military saying in an official statement that “21 innocent hostages” were killed by the militants as well as four soldiers in the rescue operation.

A railway official in Balochistan said the bodies of 25 people were transported by train away from the hostage site to the nearby town of Mach on Thursday morning.

“Deceased were identified as 19 military passengers, one police and one railway official, while four bodies are yet to be identified,” the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, told AFP.

A senior local military official overseeing operations confirmed the details.

An army official, speaking to AFP on condition of anonymity, earlier put the military toll at 28, including 27 off-duty soldiers taken hostage.

Passengers who escaped from the siege said after walking for hours through rugged mountains to reach safety that they saw people being shot dead by militants.

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The first funerals were expected to take place on Thursday evening, after the Muslim-majority nation broke its daily fast, for the holy month Ramadan.

Prime Minister Muhammad Shehbaz Sharif arrived in the provincial capital of Quetta to meet with security officials, his office said.

“The Prime Minister expressed grief and sorrow over the martyrdom of security personnel and train passengers during the operation,” according to a statement.

‘Our women pleaded’

The BLA released a video of an explosion on the track followed by dozens of militants emerging from hiding places in the mountains to attack the train.

Attacks by separatist groups have soared in the past few years, mostly targeting security forces and ethnic groups from outside the province.

Muhammad Naveed, who managed to escape, told AFP: “They asked us to come out of the train one by one. They separated women and asked them to leave. They also spared elders.”

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“They asked us to come outside, saying we will not be harmed. When around 185 people came outside, they chose people and shot them down.”

Babar Masih, a 38-year-old Christian labourer, told AFP on Wednesday he and his family walked for hours through rugged mountains to reach a train that could take them to a makeshift hospital on a railway platform.

“Our women pleaded with them and they spared us,” he said.

“They told us to get out and not look back. As we ran, I noticed many others running alongside us.”

Security forces have been battling a decades-long insurgency in impoverished Balochistan but last year saw a surge in violence in the province compared with 2023, according to the independent Center for Research and Security Studies.