India attacked Pakistan and Pakistani Kashmir yesterday (7) and Pakistan said that it had shot down five Indian fighter jets in the worst fighting in more than two decades between the nuclear-armed enemies.
India said that it struck nine Pakistani “terrorist infrastructure” sites, some of them linked to an attack by Islamist militants on Hindu tourists that killed 26 people in Indian Kashmir last month.
Islamabad said that six Pakistani locations were targeted, and that none of them were militant camps. At least 26 civilians were killed and 46 injured, a Pakistan military spokesperson said.
Indian forces attacked the headquarters of the Islamist militant groups Jaish-e-Mohammed and Lashkar-e-Taiba, an Indian defence source said.
“India has demonstrated considerable restraint in the selection of the targets and the method of execution,” the Indian Defence Ministry said in a statement.
Pakistan said that Indian missiles hit three sites and a military spokesperson said that five Indian aircraft had been shot down, a claim not confirmed by India.
However, four local Government sources in Indian Kashmir said that three fighter jets had crashed in separate areas of the Himalayan region during the night.
All three pilots had been hospitalised, the sources added.
Images circulating on local media showed a large, damaged cylindrical chunk of silver-coloured metal lying in a field at one of the crash sites.
Islamabad called the assault a “blatant act of war” and said that it had informed the United Nations (UN) Security Council that Pakistan reserved the right to respond appropriately to Indian aggression.
“All of these engagements have been done as a defensive measure,” Pakistan Military Spokesperson Ahmed Sharif Chaudhry said. “Pakistan remains a very responsible State. However, we will take all the steps necessary for defending the honour, integrity and sovereignty of Pakistan, at all cost.”
The South Asian neighbours also exchanged intense shelling and heavy gunfire across much of their de facto border in the Himalayan region of Kashmir, Police and witnesses said.
Hindu-majority India and Islamic Pakistan have fought two of their three wars since Independence in 1947 over Muslim-majority Kashmir, which both sides claim in full and control in part.
Since a 2003 ceasefire, to which both countries recommitted in 2021, targeted strikes between the neighbours are extremely rare, especially Indian strikes on Pakistani areas outside Pakistani Kashmir.
UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres called for maximum military restraint from both the countries, a spokesperson said. China, which neighbours both India and Pakistan, also called for restraint.
The Pakistani Army’s shelling across the frontier in Kashmir killed seven civilians and injured 35 in the Indian sector of the region, the Police there said.
Indian television channels showed videos of explosions, fire, large plumes of smoke in the night sky and people fleeing in several places in Pakistan and Pakistani Kashmir.
A Pakistani military spokesperson said that two mosques were among the sites hit by India. The Pakistani Defence Minister said that all the sites were civilian and not militant camps. He said that India’s claim of targeting “camps of terrorists is false”.
After India’s strikes, the Indian Army said in a post on the social media platform X yesterday: “Justice is served.”
The Indian strike goes far beyond New Delhi’s response to previous attacks in Kashmir blamed on Pakistan. Those include India’s 2019 air strike on Pakistan after 40 Indian paramilitary Police were killed in Kashmir and India’s retaliation for the deaths of 18 soldiers in 2016.
India has said that it carried out strikes in Pakistan and Pakistani-administered Kashmir. Pakistan has vowed retribution over what it describes as an “act of war.” The Pakistan Prime Minister’s office said that the armed forces of Pakistan have been authorised to undertake corresponding actions after India’s strikes. At the same time, the Pakistan Government Security Committee said that India has “ignited an inferno in the region” and that responsibility for the ensuing consequences lies squarely with New Delhi. The committee said that the world must hold India “accountable.”
A spokesperson for the Pakistani Army said that 26 civilians were killed and another 46 were injured in India’s attack yesterday. India’s military said that it struck infrastructure used by militants in Pakistan and Pakistan-administered Kashmir. India said that the operation yesterday between 1.05 a.m. and 1.30 a.m. targeted at least nine sites “where terrorist attacks against India have been planned” and were meant to “deliver justice to the victims of the Pahalgam terror attacks.” India called the strikes “non-escalatory, proportionate and responsible.” Three Indian fighter jets crashed yesterday, shortly after India announced that it was striking “terrorist infrastructure” across the border in Pakistan, media reports said, citing government sources. The wreckage was found in the Akhnoor, Ramban and Pampore regions of Jammu and Kashmir. A Pakistani military spokesperson said that five Indian aircraft were shot down. India has not verified this claim.
(Reuters and Deutsche Welle News)