Video doesn’t show Pakistan Army soldiers taken hostage by BLA separatists

The Verdict [False]
It actually shows separatists from Balochistan being arrested by Pakistani security forces, not vice versa.

What is the claim?

A 12-second video is being shared on social media, with users claiming that it shows Pakistan Army personnel taken hostage by the Balochistan Liberation Army (BLA), a separatist group that recently hijacked a passenger train traveling from Quetta to Peshawar.

Several X users shared the viral clip along with documents and visuals that were genuinely related to the incident. Other iterations of these posts included similar versions of the caption, “…Train full of #PakistanArmy soldiers Hijacked by Baloch Fighters. 6 Pak soldiers K!lled rest taken as hostage…”. One such post has garnered around 97,000 views.

Archived versions of the posts can be seen here, here, here and here.

*Screenshots of X posts falsely claiming that the viral clip shows Pakistan Army soldiers taken hostage by BLA separatists. (Source: Screenshots/X/Modified by Logically Facts)*

On March 11, 2025, BLA separatists attacked and hijacked the Jaffar Express train and took passengers hostage. The Pakistan Army on March 12 confirmed that the rescue operation had been completed. It reported that 33 militants and 21 hostages had been killed, while over 300 passengers were rescued.

What are the facts?

A reverse image search using keyframes from the viral clip led us to a YouTube video (archived here) titled “Security Forces Arrested Four Terrorists During Operation From Balochistan | Dawn News.” This video was published by the Pakistani media outlet Dawn News on March 6, 2025.

We found that a segment of the viral clip between the timestamps 0:05 and 0:08 matches the visuals seen between the timestamps 0:29 and 0:31 of the YouTube video. This confirms that the news report discusses the same incident in the viral clip.

Taking a cue from the information provided in the above video report, we found a news report about the incident published on Dawn’s website . The report cited state-run Radio Pakistan as saying, “Four terrorists were arrested during a successful operation by security forces near the Pakistan-Afghanistan border in the Toba Kakri area in Balochistan, state-run Radio Pakistan reported on Thursday.”

We also found the Radio Pakistan report that further confirmed that the incident seen in the viral clip shows separatists from Balochistan in the custody of Pakistani security forces and not vice versa, as claimed in the viral posts. The report also quoted an “arrested terrorist” saying they had “entered Pakistan three days ago from Afghanistan.”

Moreover, a version of the viral clip existed online as early as March 6, 2025, clearly showing that it is unrelated to the recent train hijacking incident in Balochistan on March 11.

The verdict

The viral clip actually shows separatists from Balochistan in the custody of Pakistani security forces and not vice-versa.

This article is written by Anurag Baruah and republished from Logically Facts. Read the original article here.