Pakistan-China's joint move to list BLA, Majeed Brigade as terror groups blocked by US, UK and France at UN

The United States, the United Kingdom and France blocked a joint bid by Pakistan and China to proscribe the Balochistan Liberation Army (BLA) and the Majeed Brigade under the UN 1267 terror sanctions regime.

They put a technical hold on the proposal citing insufficient evidence to link the outfits to Al Qaeda and ISIL, according to a report by the Economic Times.

Pakistan and China had submitted a joint bid at the UN Security Council to designate the Balochistan Liberation Army (BLA) and its suicide wing - Majeed Brigade - as a terrorist entity under the Council’s 1267 Al Qaeda Sanctions Committee, according to a report by PTI.

Pakistan’s Permanent Representative to the UN Ambassador Asim Iftikhar Ahmed said on Wednesday that terrorist entities, including ISIL-K, Al-Qaeda, Tehrik-e Taliban Pakistan, East Turkistan Islamic Movement, the BLA and its Majeed Brigade, operate from Afghan sanctuaries, with more than 60 terror camps serving as hubs for enabling cross-border attacks.

“Pakistan and China have jointly submitted to the 1267 Sanctions Committee a request to designate the BLA and Majeed Brigade. We hope the Council will act swiftly on this listing to curb their terrorist activities,” Ahmed said at the UN Security Council meeting on the situation in Afghanistan.

Ahmed further said that the Afghan Taliban authorities must fulfil their international obligations on counter-terrorism. "Terrorism emanating from Afghanistan remains the gravest threat to Pakistan’s national security,” he said, PTI reported.

Pakistan currently sits in the 15-nation Security Council as a non-permanent member for the 2025-26 term, while China is a veto-wielding permanent member of the powerful UN body.

The Majeed Brigade, formed in 2011, is reportedly a suicide squad of the BLA, and it mostly targets security forces and Chinese interests in Pakistan, according to PTI.

BLA was previously designated as an Specially Designated Global Terrorist (SDGT) by the US in 2019 following several terrorist attacks. Since then, the group has claimed responsibility for additional attacks, including by the Majeed Brigade, the State Department had said.

Last month, the US designated the BLA and its Majeed Brigade as a Foreign Terrorist Organisation. The State Department added the Majeed Brigade as an alias to BLA’s previous Specially Designated Global Terrorist (SDGT) designation.