India’s army on Thursday accused Pakistan of violating a ceasefire along their militarised border, accusing it of trying to push Islamic militants into divided Kashmir under the cover of fire.
A defence spokesman said Indian military posts in southern Kashmir came under small arms and mortar fire from across the border in a pre-dawn skirmish with Pakistani troops that lasted around two hours.
‘Pakistani troops opened unprovoked firing at Indian posts and targeted several positions in Poonch’ district, Lieutenant Colonel Biplab Nath said in Indian Kashmir’s winter capital Jammu.
‘Our soldiers retaliated to the firing,’ Nath said, adding there were no casualties on the Indian side in Poonch, a hilly Kashmir district some 240 kilometres northwest of Jammu.
The Press Trust of India quoted an Indian commander as saying dozens of mortar shells exploded around Indian posts.
‘It is ceasefire violation and it was aimed at infiltrating militants into this side of the Line of Control,’ brigadier S Dua said, referring to a de facto border which divides the Indian and Pakistani zones of Kashmir.
India has in the past accused the Pakistani army of providing covering fire for infiltrating militants. Islamabad denies the charge.
Meanwhile, 20 people were hurt Thursday in fresh clashes with the police after the death of a nine-year old boy injured during a weekend protest in Indian Kashmir, the police said.
The death brought to 59 the number of protesters and bystanders killed in two months of violent protests in the mainly Muslim-majority Kashmir Valley, most of them young men or teenagers shot dead by security forces.
They agreed to a ceasefire along the LoC in 2003 and began a peace process in 2004. Since then there have been sporadic clashes with both sides accusing each other of violating the truce.
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