Editor’s Note: This is the first article in a two-part series on the U.S. designation of the BLA as an FTO. Read the second article here.
On August 11, the U.S. Department of State designated the Baloch Liberation Army (BLA) and its alias/elite suicide squad, the Majeed Brigade, as a Foreign Terrorist Organization (FTO). The move comes in the wake of both improved bilateral relations between the United States and Pakistan—culminating in a private meeting in June between Field Marshal Asim Munir and U.S. President Donald Trump, and engagements covering everything from cryptocurrency, to trade, to critical minerals and energy—and a deteriorating security situation in Balochistan, Pakistan’s mineral-rich but most deprived province. Indeed, according to the Balochistan Home Department’s mid-year report, violence across the province has surged by 45 percent in the first half of 2025 compared to the same period last year, with incidents including insurgent attacks, targeted killings, and bombings. In recent years, the BLA has conducted some of the most audacious attacks Pakistan has seen, including an unprecedented hijacking of the Jaffar Express train in March 2025, which killed over 30 civilian and security personnel.
The designation of the BLA as an FTO fulfills one of Pakistan’s longstanding political demands of Washington, and as such is a significant diplomatic and political win for Pakistan that may also entrench counterterrorism cooperation with the United States. However, the history of FTO designations and the Baloch separatist movement’s distinct dynamics show that this designation may not be sufficient to considerably weaken the BLA, or ultimately dismantle it, absent other changes in governance.
Security and Political Implications
For Pakistan, the designation of the BLA and the Majeed Brigade as FTOs acknowledges Pakistan’s own role as a “steadfast bulwark against terrorism” and validates its claim that the BLA is a terrorist organization fostering fear and chaos, not fighting for the rights and emancipation of the Baloch people. The state has long argued that the BLA thrives on propaganda and youth radicalization, and alleged support from external powers. In the wake of the sustained increase in militant violence in Balochistan, Pakistan therefore seeks to undercut the group’s claim to having local roots and to garner support for kinetic operations against it. Moreover, the designation potentially enables U.S.-Pakistan counterterrorism cooperation beyond the scope of fighting religiously-driven violent extremist groups, such as the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP).
“The history of FTO designations and the Baloch separatist movement’s distinct dynamics show that this designation may not be sufficient to considerably weaken the BLA, or ultimately dismantle it, absent other changes in governance.”
As the BLA has intensified attacks in recent years, the state has sought to blur the distinction between this group and those like the TTP. While the TTP is widely associated with the Afghan Taliban and a fundamentalist religious ideology that rejects democracy and the Pakistani constitution, the Pakistani state posits that casting the BLA in contrast to the TTP—rooted in historical grievances, political marginalization, and repeated military operations by the state—only lends legitimacy to the violence of Baloch separatist groups. This is even more of a concern as reports of tactical cooperation between the BLA and the TTP grow. The FTO designation thereby legitimizes the Pakistani state’s narrative of what exactly ails its most restive province and may open the door to deeper counterterrorism cooperation as a potential solution to that problem.
Beyond curtailing the BLA’s financial resources and restricting the mobility of its leadership, the FTO designation could also impede the activities of the Baloch diaspora that supports or sympathizes with the separatist cause. The Baloch diaspora has been instrumental in shaping the narrative around the separatist movement and the province’s resource exploitation as a result of the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC), especially via social media, and is an alleged source of financial support for militant groups.
The decision to list the BLA and its suicide unit as FTOs is even more significant in light of recent U.S. interest in investing in Pakistan’s mineral and energy resources, as one of the three criteria invoked for designating an organization is whether it threatens “the security of U.S. national or economic interests.” With potential U.S. investments in Balochistan, Washington may now have a direct stake in ensuring political stability in the province and curbing the operational capacity of Baloch separatist groups. Some counterterrorism cooperation in Balochistan already exists, as demonstrated by the collaboration of the CIA and ISI to capture and extradite the planner of the Abbey Gate bombing from the province’s borderlands. With the Islamic State in Pakistan Province (ISPP), which has a transnational ideology and explicitly threatens U.S. interests, considered to be maintaining a presence in Balochistan, counterterrorism cooperation between Pakistan and the United States could expand on this existing basis.
A greater U.S. counterterrorism role in Balochistan, where CPEC is centered and China is heavily invested in copper and mineral extraction, could both pose a challenge for Beijing and help ameliorate it. Citing perceived inequities, exploitation of resources without local consent, and demographic fears, the BLA has consistently targeted Chinese nationals and infrastructure projects since 2018 to undermine CPEC itself by sowing distrust between Beijing and Islamabad and sabotaging their shared vision for regional connectivity and transnational trade corridors. This strategy has put not-insignificant pressure on the China-Pakistan relationship: last year, the Chinese ambassador to Pakistan publicly expressed frustration over Pakistan’s inability to ensure security for Chinese nationals, and reports suggest that China considered deploying its own security for the protection of its citizens in Pakistan. While increased U.S. counterterrorism presence could raise apprehensions in the region and create geopolitical friction, it might also indirectly benefit China by enhancing security in a region critical to its strategic and economic interests.
Limits to FTO Designation
The effectiveness of an FTO designation—notionally invoked for the purpose of imposing financial sanctions, immigration restriction, or other penalties in the name of national security—is contingent upon the sources of funding and reliance of the militant organization on the United States and its financial system. While Baloch separatist groups have been able to garner some rare rhetorical support from select U.S. representatives in the past, there is no evidence that the BLA has financial assets parked in the country or that their leaders frequently travel there. The little publicly-available data on the nature of funding of the Baloch separatist groups point to a variety of sources, including their linkages to a thriving informal economy in the borderlands of Balochistan, extortion from coal miners and investors involved in the extraction and transfer of mineral resources to other parts of the country, and alleged financial backing from neighboring states. All of them operate beyond the pale of the law and their sources largely operate outside the reach of U.S. legal or financial systems.
Although FTO designation by a global superpower like the United States can carry symbolic and diplomatic weight, it does not necessarily result in the weakening or dismantling of terrorist organizations, nor does it necessarily limit their capacity to carry out terrorist attacks. Numerous militant organizations, including Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Kurdish Workers Party, all designated as FTOs in 1997, continue to operate as potent militant entities to this day. In Pakistan itself, the TTP was designated an FTO in 2010; despite the designation, the TTP has been the most dangerous internal security threat to Pakistan over the past nearly two decades. While it suffered setbacks between 2015 and 2019, the group has reemerged as a formidable threat after the Taliban’s takeover of Kabul in August 2021. This illustrates the intractable nature of internal conflicts driven by ideologies, long-term grievances, and maximalist demands—which characterizes the BLA’s stance against the Pakistani state as well.
“Concrete counter-terrorism collaboration depends on the continuity of the current positive trajectory in U.S.-Pakistan relations more generally, and more specifically on U.S. political investment, including the involvement of American companies in Balochistan’s energy and mineral sectors, in ensuring Pakistan’s own political stability.”
Further complicating the matter is how prone the Trump administration may be to political volte-faces, as experienced by Pakistan during his first term and as currently being witnessed by India. Despite the FTO designation, the BLA and most Baloch separatist groups have not directly threatened U.S. interests; with the exception of the Hyrbyair Marri-led BLA faction, these groups lack transnational aims. As such, whether the FTO designation of the BLA and the Majeed Brigade leads to concrete counter-terrorism collaboration depends on the continuity of the current positive trajectory in U.S.-Pakistan relations more generally, and more specifically on U.S. political investment, including the involvement of American companies in Balochistan’s energy and mineral sectors, in ensuring Pakistan’s own political stability.
Addressing Local Roots of Insurgency
The external recognition of the BLA threat and its FTO designation is certainly a diplomatic win for Pakistan and its narrative that BLA is a terrorist organization rather than a legitimate entity. It also opens opportunities for potential counterterrorism cooperation with Washington in support of its kinetic actions. But in the context of an insurgent movement that is growing more lethal and complex, enmeshing local grievances and discontent with evolving regional dynamics and geopolitical competition, the designation of the BLA alone cannot solve this long-intractable challenge. Lasting peace and prosperity in the region will ultimately depend on policies that address the root causes of the conflict.
After all, the insurgency in Balochistan has deep political and economic roots that go back several decades. The troubled relationship between the state and the Baloch population stems from historical grievances, a perceived sense of economic exclusion, and the suppression of political rights. The current separatist insurgency is the fifth wave of violence and the most prolonged conflict in Balochistan’s history, affecting a large part of the province and attracting a steady stream of recruits, including women, into its ranks. This trend speaks to the continued and indeed increasing appeal of the BLA and similar groups among some segments of the Baloch population.
Secessionist movements emerge due to a lack of political integration and the squashing of space for political dissent and grievance. The BLA and its alias, the Majeed Brigade, are thus symptoms of state neglect of the country’s largest province, and derive their support from an alienated youth. The state’s counterinsurgency policy should be guided by an overarching political vision, acknowledging past mistakes—such as frequent use of military force and exploitation of the province’s mineral and energy resources without benefitting the local people—and avoiding the perpetuation of such policies in relation to CPEC and the Saindak project. This vision should allow the development of an organic political process through fair elections, address the resolution of the missing person issue, and uplift people in a province where the multidimensional poverty index is over 70 percent and the maternal mortality rate is double the national average. Only by confronting historical and political grievances and presenting a compelling state narrative that wins over the local population to its side can Pakistan’s kinetic efforts translate into enduring stability and peace.
Views expressed are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect the positions of South Asian Voices, the Stimson Center, or our supporters.
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Image 1: Arslan Arshad via X
Image 2: State Department CT Bureau via X
