ISLAMABAD: Pakistan’s planning minister Asad Umar denied on Friday the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) projects had slowed down, reported the local media, though he added that security threats had increased in the country due to the opposition of various international forces to the initiative.
Umar’s statement came only a day after the country’s newly appointed chairman of the CPEC authority, Khalid Mansoor, told the Senate Standing Committee on Planning and Development that Chinese companies were not satisfied with the pace of work on the multi-billion-dollar economic corridor that seeks to connect Pakistan’s Gwadar port with the Chinese province of Xinjiang.
The committee meeting was chaired by an opposition politician, Saleem Mandviwalla, who said the Chinese ambassador had complained to him that the government had “destroyed” CPEC and “no work was done [on the corridor] in the past three years.”
“Umar rejected the perception that CPEC had slowed down over the past three years and claimed the major work on the corridor projects had been completed during the tenure of the current PTI [Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf] government,” reported Dawn newspaper.
The planning minister said the economic corridor was facing security challenges on “an elevated level,” adding that the country’s top civilian and military leadership had taken effective measures and shared their details with the Chinese authorities.
He maintained that Pakistani politicians should be careful while discussing the project, saying it was not right to describe it as “closed down, finished or destroyed.”
The planning minister noted his government had completed several infrastructure and power projects with the Chinese.
He said that the previous Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz administration had ignored the western corridor at the heart of CPEC which was taken up by the current government.
Umar also maintained that the PTI administration had largely operationalized three industrial zones under the corridor project.
Last month, a suicide bomb attack on a motorcade carrying Chinese personnel injured one Chinese national and killed two local children. The incident took place on the East Bay Expressway in the southern port of Gwadar.
In July, a suicide bomber attacked a bus carrying workers to a dam construction site in northern Pakistan, killing 13 people, including nine Chinese nationals.
Pakistan’s foreign minister said Pakistani Taliban militants known as Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) were behind that attack. The TTP has denied it was involved.
Pakistan’s planning minister denies slow pace of work on CPEC projects
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Pakistan’s planning minister denies slow pace of work on CPEC projects
- Asad Umar says the economic corridor is facing security threats due to the opposition of international powers to the initiative
- The chairman of the country’s CPEC authority recently told a Senate committee the Chinese firms were not satisfied with Pakistan’s pace of work
‘Look ahead or look up?’: Pakistan’s police face new challenge as militants take to drone warfare
- Officials say militants are using weapons and equipment left behind after allied forces withdrew from Afghanistan
- Police in northwest Pakistan say electronic jammers have helped repel more than 300 drone attacks since mid-2025
BANNU, Pakistan: On a quiet morning last July, Constable Hazrat Ali had just finished his prayers at the Miryan police station in Pakistan’s volatile northwest when the shouting began.
His colleagues in Bannu district spotted a small speck in the sky. Before Ali could take cover, an explosion tore through the compound behind him. It was not a mortar or a suicide vest, but an improvised explosive dropped from a drone.
“Now should we look ahead or look up [to sky]?” said Ali, who was wounded again in a second drone strike during an operation against militants last month. He still carries shrapnel scars on his back, hand and foot, physical reminders of how the battlefield has shifted upward.
For police in the northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) province, the fight against militancy has become a three-dimensional conflict. Pakistani officials say armed groups, including the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), are increasingly deploying commercial drones modified to drop explosives, alongside other weapons they say were acquired after the US military withdrawal from neighboring Afghanistan.
Security analysts say the trend mirrors a wider global pattern, where low-cost, commercially available drones are being repurposed by non-state actors from the Middle East to Eastern Europe, challenging traditional policing and counterinsurgency tactics.
The escalation comes as militant violence has surged across Pakistan. Islamabad-based Pakistan Institute for Conflict and Security Studies (PICSS) reported a 73 percent rise in combat-related deaths in 2025, with fatalities climbing to 3,387 from 1,950 a year earlier. Militants have increasingly shifted operations from northern tribal belts to southern KP districts such as Bannu, Lakki Marwat and Dera Ismail Khan.
“Bannu is an important town of southern KP, and we are feeling the heat,” said Sajjad Khan, the region’s police chief. “There has been an enormous increase in the number of incidents of terrorism… It is a mix of local militants and Afghan militants.”
In 2025 alone, Bannu police recorded 134 attacks on stations, checkpoints and personnel. At least 27 police officers were killed, while authorities say 53 militants died in the clashes. Many assaults involved coordinated, multi-pronged attacks using heavy weapons.
Drones have also added a new layer of danger. What began as reconnaissance tools have been weaponized with improvised devices that rely on gravity rather than guidance systems.
“Earlier, they used to drop [explosives] in bottles. After that, they started cutting pipes for this purpose,” said Jamshed Khan, head of the regional bomb disposal unit. “Now we have encountered a new type: a pistol hand grenade.”
When dropped from above, he explained, a metal pin ignites the charge on impact.
Deputy Superintendent of Police Raza Khan, who narrowly survived a drone strike during construction at a checkpoint, described devices packed with nails, bullets and metal fragments.
“They attach a shuttlecock-like piece on top. When they drop it from a height, its direction remains straight toward the ground,” he said.
TARGETING CIVILIANS
Officials say militants’ rapid adoption of drone technology has been fueled by access to equipment on informal markets, while police procurement remains slower.
“It is easy for militants to get such things,” Sajjad Khan said. “And for us, I mean, we have to go through certain process and procedures as per rules.”
That imbalance began to shift in mid-2025, when authorities deployed electronic anti-drone systems in the region. Before that, officers relied on snipers or improvised nets strung over police compounds.
“Initially, when we did not have that anti-drone system, their strikes were effective,” the police chief said, adding that more than 300 attempted drone attacks have since been repelled or electronically disrupted. “That was a decisive moment.”
Police say militants have also targeted civilians, killing nine people in drone attacks this year, often in communities accused of cooperating with authorities. Several police stations suffered structural damage.
Bannu’s location as a gateway between Pakistan and Afghanistan has made it a security flashpoint since colonial times. But officials say the aerial dimension of the conflict has placed unprecedented strain on local forces.
For constables like Hazrat Ali, new technology offers some protection, but resolve remains central.
“Nowadays, they have ammunition and all kinds of the most modern weapons. They also have large drones,” he said. “When we fight them, we fight with our courage and determination.”
