Three Indian soldiers killed in retaliatory fire
LoC (Kashmir): Pakistan on Wednesday claimed to have killed three Indian soldiers in “retaliatory firing” across the Line of Control (LoC).
“There are reports that three Indian soldiers were killed and five injured [in retaliatory fire by Pakistani troops],” Pakistan military’s media wing, the Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR) said in a press release.
ISPR said Indian “unprovoked firing” in the Rawalakot and Chirikot sectors “targeted civilian populations” in the villages of Kahuta, Chaffar, Serian and Narakot.
“Pakistan army posts are effectively engaging Indian posts,”, ISPR said, adding that Indian posts had suffered heavy damage.
According to a report in Dawn, Indian troops resorted to heavy shelling from across the LoC in which a woman and her younger brother were killed and two others injured.
Shelling began at 6am in the Abbaspur sector of Poonch district and remained “intense and indiscriminate” until 9am, Qaisar Aurangzeb, assistant commissioner of the area, told Dawn.
“The Indians used both small and heavy arms, targeting the innocent and defenceless civilian population without any provocation,” the official said.
One of the shells landed on the house of one Haji Sakhi Mohammad Kiyani in Chaffar village, killing his two children on the spot, he said. Their house was also badly damaged, the Dawn report said.
He identified the deceased as Zakia, 22, and Kashif, 20.
Additionally, Nazira Begum, 60, and Kausar, 35, were injured in Chaffar.
While the Indian media has reported death of one Indian soldier amidst continued shelling by Pakistani troops across the LoC.
A PTI report said that Pakistani troops on Wednesday opened fire from automatic weapons and shelled mortars at forward posts and villages along the LoC in Jammu and Kashmir’s Poonch district.
The Indian Army is retaliating effectively and the firing is still on, a Defence Spokesman told PTI.
“Pakistan Army initiated unprovoked and indiscriminate firing of small arms, automatics and mortars from 0845 hours in Poonch sector along the Line of Control (LoC)”, the spokesman said.
Yesterday, an Army jawan was killed when Pakistan Army violated the ceasefire along the LoC in Poonch, the report added.
Naik Mahendra Chemjung, who was grievously injured in the Pakistani shelling, succumbed to injuries in Poonch.
