The Balochistan Liberation Army (BLA) claimed responsibility for a series of deadly attacks in Pakistan's southwestern Balochistan province on Monday, resulting in at least 70 deaths, including 14 soldiers. The coordinated assaults targeted police stations, railway lines and highways.

In the deadliest incident, BLA militants took control of a highway and shot dead at least 23 people, mostly laborers from the neighboring Punjab province, in what the province's chief minister described as "execution-style shootings."

Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif said that the separatists wanted to disrupt China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) development projects that aim to expand Beijing's presence in Pakistan and across Central and South Asia in order to counter influence from the United States and India in the region.

Sharif vowed retaliation for the violence, which coincided with a visit from a top Chinese general to the Pakistani capital, Islamabad.

Beijing has heavily invested in the region through the CPEC, part of Chinese President Xi Jinping's flagship Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) to reach markets in the Middle East, Europe, Africa and beyond.

The Baloch are a Sunni Muslim ethnic group who live on both sides of the Iran-Pakistan border, and also in parts of southern Afghanistan. Balochistan forms the largest part of this region, followed by the province of Sistan and Balochistan on the Iranian side.

The area, which is roughly the size of........

© Deutsche Welle