The Balochistan government recently introduced the province's Youth Policy 2024. The policy's launch was marked by grand declarations from Chief Minister Sarfraz Bugti, emphasising the policy's potential to create opportunities and provide resources for the province's youth.
However, these assurances seem disconnected from the province's reality today, particularly given the efforts to suppress the recent sit-in by the Baloch Yakjehti Committee (BYC), which sought to highlight residents' longstanding grievances, including the unresolved issue of missing persons.
The policy document itself lacks substantive content, offering little in the way of actionable plans or sound justifications. Many of the proposed initiatives repackage existing national and provincial initiatives. The strategy appears to narrowly address the economic challenges faced by Baloch youth, focusing predominantly on already existing skills development and employment. It suggests combating drug use and facilitating inter-provincial and international exchanges are key to youth empowerment and participation. A heavy emphasis has been laid on narrative development, proposing it as a solution to address longstanding grievances and complaints such as those about missing persons. This perspective, however, is simplistic and reminiscent of the counter-insurgency and deradicalisation efforts seen in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) from 2005 onwards, where thousands of young men underwent 'rehabilitation'. Unfortunately, there is little evidence available on that process, its impact, and the credibility of the claims about its success.
The strategy also proposes several new structures, many of which are to be led by officials who are in their 50s and 60s, including the chief minister. These leaders appear far removed from the realities faced by the youth. The policy suffers from a conspicuous absence of genuine forums or mechanisms for youth engagement beyond token events and conferences, and no provision for essential inter-generational dialogue to bridge the gap between the older and younger generations. Additionally, the plan includes a project implementation office, reportedly already tasked to a KP-based counter-insurgency contractor, raising serious concerns about whether the Baloch youth have been genuinely consulted, given the opportunity, or trained to participate in the policy's formulation, or whether they have been included in any meaningful capacity to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals so abundantly quoted in the document.
Unfortunately, it is hard to see this document, co-drafted and stamped as approved by the United Nations Country Team, as a youth policy.
It is well-documented that securitised approaches are ineffective when applied to youth populations. Moreover, research consistently demonstrates that when youth employment schemes are framed as counter-insurgency measures, they often backfire, particularly if perceived as tools for the political or state elite.
In a fragile context like Balochistan, donor-supported programmes which proclaim to create employment and other opportunities for the youth must move beyond superficial efforts and be scaled to make a genuine impact on the millions of young people trapped in a state of "waithood." When government-led youth programmes are designed to counter insurgency, donors and the UN system rush to include safeguards to prevent them from becoming instruments of the state or party elite's clientelist machinery, protect recipients from exploitation by the political and security elite, or risk exacerbating the frustrations that insurgents exploit for recruitment.
Past experiences in Balochistan (and other parts of Pakistan) have demonstrated that counter-insurgency operations and securitised socio-economic approaches have yielded only short-term, limited tactical benefits. Brute force only deepens the insurgency and dissatisfaction, possibly leading to even greater challenges for Pakistan as a whole. Lessons from the handling of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa during various military operations should guide future strategies, yet it seems that those in power and the bilateral and multilateral development community are determined to repeat the same mistakes.
The Baloch youth, who constitute 75% of the province's population, are at the heart of this crisis. They require genuine support and opportunities to break free from the cycle of violence and work towards peaceful, non-violent solutions
Despite possessing vast resources and strategic significance, the Pakistani state, a major party in the conflict, has demonstrated a concerning inability to effectively manage political issues. Both the provincial and national political and security leadership appear trapped in a binary mindset, unable to fully comprehend the situation's complexities. The recent crackdown on movements like the BYC exemplifies this limitation. Instead of engaging in complex problem-solving, the state's response has been to suppress and label these movements as threats to national security. This binary approach is not only outdated but dangerously shortsighted.
Armed groups, feeling threatened by the rise of new civic leaders, have escalated their violence in a desperate attempt to remain relevant. This situation starkly exposes the failures of counter-insurgency programmes implemented in KP years ago. It is alarming that the same contractors are now being entrusted with handling Baloch youth at this critical moment.
While the national political and security leadership struggles within its intentional or unintentional limitations, the United Nations country team has also failed to impress in its role as a promoter of global values in such a volatile state. With their vast professional backgrounds, the UN country team should know that in situations such as present-day Pakistan, it has a responsibility to programme preventive actions that minimise civilian suffering. The UNCT, multilateral, and bilateral donors, including the Asian Development Bank and the World Bank, must ensure that development activities are guided by the principles of "Do No Harm" and 'Conflict Sensitivity' as indicated in the World Bank's own 'Pathway to Peace' and various instruments signed within the UN system and OECD.
For the youth in particular, the United Nations Security Council's adoption of Resolution 2250 on Youth, Peace, and Security (YPS) in 2015 marked the beginning of a global effort to position young people as central actors in peace and stability. Following this, the UN released a comprehensive study and, subsequently, a five-pillar global strategic framework to guide policy formulation and programming. One would imagine that in the last nine years, the UN system has completed its mandate and that Pakistani youth residing outside of Islamabad are made aware of the latest developments and provided comparative knowledge on strategies and opportunities for peace.
The Baloch youth, who constitute 75% of the province's population, are at the heart of this crisis. They require genuine support and opportunities to break free from the cycle of violence and work towards peaceful, non-violent solutions. The Pathways to Peace and YPS agenda provide such tools and strategies.
The opportunity, however, is not lost; the UN and donors need to ensure that support is provided to develop a policy that reflects international best practices and the latest research. Another, faster and cheaper way of achieving this outcome is to delegate the task to the non-UN, non-governmental sector, which may be given the opportunity to lead a genuine, non-securitised, inclusive, and meaningful consultative process to revise the existing policy and propose an addendum. Furthermore, young Baloch leaders must play a central role in designing, conceptualising, and implementing the Baloch Youth Policy.
The Baloch youth are not the problem—they represent the solution. It is crucial that the state and development partners take youth and their demands seriously.