Pakistan: More Soldiers Killed by Indian Fire in Kashmir

Pakistan has summoned India’s top
diplomat to protest the killing of two of
its soldiers on Thursday in what
Islamabad condemned as “continued
unprovoked” Indian fire along the
disputed Kashmir border. Military
officials say that such Indian attacks
within the past 24 hours have left at
least three Pakistani soldiers dead and
wounded several others.

Tensions have been running high
between the nuclear-armed rivals since
early August, when India accused
Pakistani troops of ambushing and
killing five Indian soldiers in a remote
Kashmir district.
Islamabad denies the charges and has
since accused New Delhi of repeated
violations of a mutually agreed to
cease-fire in the disputed Himalayan
territory.

Pakistani army officials allege the latest
Indian “unprovoked” aggression took
place Thursday evening in the
“Hotspring” sector of Kashmir, killing at
least one Pakistani soldier and
wounding two others.
The incident came just hours after
Pakistan announced the death of one of
its soldiers in a similar Indian attack
along the military line of control dividing
Kashmir.

A Foreign Ministry statement says that
the Indian high commissioner was
summoned to protest the killings of
Pakistani soldiers and to convey
Islamabad’s “serious concerns over the
continued and unwarranted cease-fire
violations” by the Indian army.
It added that Foreign Secretary Jalil
Abbas Jilani also urged India to “desist
from such acts,” warning they have the
potential to further escalate the tension.

Earlier on Thursday, Pakistan's Foreign
Ministry spokesman, Aizaz Ahmed
Chaudhry, told a weekly news briefing
that Islamabad is demonstrating
restraint in the wake of unprovoked
Indian fire and the policy “should not be
construed as a weakness.”

He said India needs to reduce the
Kashmir tension and engage in a
dialogue with Pakistan to settle
differences. The spokesman again
rejected allegations that Pakistani troops
were responsible for the killings of
Indian troops.

“On our side we investigated and we
found that none of Pakistani side was
involved in it and we conveyed that to
the Indian side," he said. "It is for the
Indian government to investigate as to
what happened and how it happened.
Pakistan, which in itself has been
suffering from terrorism, cannot be held
responsible for any act of terrorism that
may have happened on the other side of
the Line of Control," said Chaudhry.
New Delhi has long accused the
Pakistani military of training and
sending Islamist militants into the
Indian-ruled portion of Kashmir to fuel a
separatist insurgency there. Military
leaders in India say that this year, there
has been a spike in attempts by
militants to infiltrate into Kashmir.

On Monday, Indian Defense Minister
A.K. Antony warned in a statement that
his country was running out of patience
with what he called Pakistan army-
backed transgressions across the
disputed Kashmir border. He demanded
Pakistan act against its troops involved
in the killing of Indian soldiers in the
latest incident as well as the killing of
two troops back in January.

The alleged Indian hostilities also
dominated affairs in the morning
session of the National Assembly, the
lower house of the Pakistani parliament,
where lawmakers unanimously adopted
an anti-India resolution moved by the
federal minister for defense production,
Rana Tanveer Hussain.

“This house condemns this act of
aggression and also expresses its
serious concern over the continued
violations of the cease-fire across the
LoC [Line of Control in Kashmir] by the
India army and demands for a
constructive, sustained and result-
oriented process of engagement [with
India]. The people of Pakistan fully
stand behind their civil and military
leadership to defend the territory of
Pakistan," said Hussain.

The clashes in Kashmir, many believe,
have undermined a push by Pakistan’s
newly-elected prime minister, Nawaz
Sharif, to normalize relations with India.
In his first address to the nation earlier
this week, Sharif emphasized that
instead of fighting one another, Pakistan
and India should jointly wage a war
against poverty, illiteracy and
backwardness plaguing their region.

Just days before the latest hostilities
broke out in Kashmir, the two countries
were about to resume their stalled wide-
ranging peace dialogue to settle bilateral
disputes that have long strained ties
between India and Pakistan.

Analysts are worried the tensions could
derail efforts on both sides to arrange a
meeting between Prime Minister Sharif
and his Indian counterpart, Manmohan
Singh, in New York next month on the
sidelines of the United Nations General
Assembly

Indian Fire in Kashmir