Dead or alive? Surviving Pakistan’s 28-hour train hijack in an engine | Armed Groups

Quetta, Pakistan — On the cold morning of March 11, Saad Qamar wore his white and blue uniform, said goodbye to his parents and left his home at 7:30am (06:30 GMT) for the Pakistan Railways loco-shed half a kilometre away.

The 31-year-old assistant train driver signed a duty form before examining the engine he was going to attach to the Peshawar-bound Jaffar Express for its journey of 1,600km (994 miles) from Pakistan’s southwestern city of Quetta to Peshawar in the northwestern…