Word: jundullah
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...Baluchistan, the cooperation of old has shifted to a more guarded mutual distrust. On Oct. 18, Jundullah, a Baluch militia based on Pakistani soil struck the Iranian border city of Pishin, killing 41, including a number of senior figures in the Iranian Revolutionary Guards. A week later, Pakistani troops detained 11 Iranian agents who had infiltrated across the border, possibly in a mission aimed against Jundullah. They were eventually released, but the incidents spotlighted the uncomfortable place Baluchistan occupies in both Tehran and Islamabad's internal affairs - and their dealings with each other...
...some Pakistani officials linking Baluch separatism to the activities of the Taliban are wrong, says Harrison. Baluch nationalism has always been a secular project; its militant fronts warring with Pakistan, like the Baluch Liberation Army, descend from a tradition of Marxist-Leninist guerrillas that took root in the 1970s. Jundullah, though an avowedly Sunni group, articulates its identity as a rejection of the Shia clerics ruling Iran - a political act - rather than one born out any particular fervor...
...remained mostly quiet on the matter, in part because it only has so much leverage that it can wield over the Pakistani military. During the Bush administration, there were suggestions that Washington was even secretly backing anti-Iranian groups like Jundullah and staging covert operations against Iran from Baluchistan. But a more public effort to reach a just solution for Baluch grievances would go a long way toward securing stability for Pakistan in general. The Baluch disturbances have put on hold plans to build a lucrative gas pipeline from Iran to India via Pakistan - a link that would enhance regional...
...Despite the long-standing tensions between Tehran and the Baluchis - as well as other minorities that, together, make up almost half of Iran's population - the authorities were quick to blame the attack on outsiders. Besides condemning alleged Western support for Jundullah, the Iranian government sharply criticized Pakistan, from whose territory the bombers were said to have entered Iran, and demanded that Islamabad act against the group...
...Leverett wrote recently in the New York Times of their conversations with Iranian leaders, saying "President Obama has had several opportunities to send ... signals [of good intent] to Tehran - such as ending Bush-era covert programs against Iran - but has punted." Iran has long suspected that groups such as Jundullah are supported as part of the covert campaign, and in 2007, ABC News alleged that Jundullah had secretly received advice and encouragement from U.S. intelligence officials...