Pakistani troops freed dozens of train passengers taken hostage by armed militants in the country's southwest on Tuesday, with hundreds more still being held in the deadly siege.Security sources said that heavy gunfire was ongoing between security forces and the militants.Gunmen forced the train to a halt in a remote, mountainous area of Balochistan province on Tuesday afternoon, with the assault immediately claimed by the Baloch Liberation Army (BLA), a separatist group behind rising violence in the province which borders Afghanistan and Iran.’Security forces have successfully freed 80 hostages, including 43 men, 26 women, and 11 children, from the terrorists,’ security sources told AFP, adding that 13 militants had been killed.’Efforts are ongoing to ensure the safe release of the remaining passengers. The terrorists have been surrounded, and the operation will continue until the last terrorist is neutralized.’A nearby railway station in Mach has been turned into a makeshift hospital to receive some of the wounded.The driver of the train, a police officer and soldier were all killed in the assault, according to paramedic Nazim Farooq and railway official Muhammad Aslam, both at Mach railway station.Earlier in the day, Muhammad Kashif, a senior railway government official in Quetta, the capital of the province, told AFP that ‘over 450 passengers onboard are being held hostage by gunmen.’In a statement, the BLA said gunmen bombed the railway track before storming aboard the train.’The militants swiftly took control of the train and have taken all passengers hostage,’ said the statement released to media.The group ‘warned of severe consequences’ if an attempt is made to rescue the hostages.The incident happened around 1:00 pm (0800 GMT) in rural Sibi district, near to a city station where the train had been due to stop.The train had left Quetta for Peshawar, in northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa — a more than 30-hour journey — at around 9:00 am.A senior police official from the area bordering Sibi, who asked not to be named because he was not authorised to speak to the media, said that ‘the train remains stuck just before a tunnel surrounded by mountains’.An emergency has been imposed at hospitals in Sibi, according to the government official.The area is a mountainous region making it easier for militants to have hideouts and plan attacks.Security forces have been battling a decades-long insurgency in impoverished Balochistan, which militant groups claim is being exploited by outsiders, with wealth from its natural resources syphoned off with little benefit to the local population.
