Srinagar, Kashmir/Islamabad – The chief of Pakistan’s military warned India against aggravating border tensions after three militants were killed in an attack on an Indian army camp in the disputed region of Kashmir.
Army Chief Raheel Sharif said in a speech that the Pakistani military was capable of responding “befittingly” to any aggression from New Delhi.
“We will go to any extent to defend our country,” Sharif said at a ceremony for newly inducted cadets of the air force.
His comments come hours after Indian soldiers killed three suspected militants who attacked an army camp in northern Jammu and Kashmir state.
Suspected militants attack army camp in Indian Kashmir – Indian paramilitary troopers stand guard near graffiti written on shop shutters in Srinagar in Indian controlled Kashmir. Suspected militants attacked an army camp in the Handwara district of Kashmir on Thursday, Indian police said.(Photo: Umer Asif/Pacific Press via ZUMA Wire)
It was the third time in 20 days that militants tried to storm an Indian army camp in Kashmir, a Himalayan valley divided in parts between the two countries.
Commanding officer Colonel Rajeev Saha said militants from Pakistan infiltrated the Line of Control (LoC), a de facto frontier that separates parts of Kashmir.
The incident comes amid heightened tension between the nuclear-capable South Asian neighbours, who have fought two wars over Kashmir.
India has accused Pakistan of aiding militants who carry out attacks on Indian territory. Islamabad denies the charge calling Kashmiri militants freedom fighters.
Since the attack, there have been regular exchanges of fire by Indian and Pakistani troops across the LoC and their border in the region, violating a 2003 ceasefire.
Indian officials last week claimed their forces staged “surgical strikes” on the Pakistani side of the border against militants’ “launch pads.”
But Islamabad denied this, saying only cross-border firing took place.
Also on Thursday, a media report said Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif ordered the country’s intelligence agencies to move against militant groups allegedly behind attacks in India.
Sharif asked the chief of the Inter Service Intelligence (ISI) spy agency to act against Lashkar-e-Toiba and Jaish-e-Mohamed, militant groups suspected to be behind a 2008 Mumbai attack and this year’s airbase assault in India respectively, according to Dawn newspaper.
The Pakistani military and its intelligence services have long been accused of supporting these groups and the Haqqani network of the Afghan Taliban.
But Sharif said the policy can’t continue because it had isolated the country internationally.
Both Pakistan’s Foreign Ministry and Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif denied the accuracy of the Thursday report. Sharif’s office said the report was “a mixture of fiction and half-truths,” which had been taken out of context.
-dpa
