Pakistan, India Exchange Fresh Fire in Kashmir
TEHRAN (Tasnim) – Pakistan and India exchanged fresh fire across Kashmir border Saturday, the Pakistani military said, with Indian officials stating there was no damage as tensions rise between the nuclear-armed rivals.
"Pakistani troops befittingly responded to Indian unprovoked firing" which started at 4:00 a.m. and continued for four hours in Bhimber sector on the Pakistani side of the border, a military statement said, AFP reported.
It did not mention casualties.
"There was small arms fire and mortar shells fire from across the border in Akhnoor sector which lasted for around two hours (4 a.m. to 6 a.m.)," Pawan Kotwal, a top civilian official in Jammu and Kashmir state on the Indian side, said.
"No damage was caused. We are ready for any eventuality but it is peaceful in Jammu region."
The skirmish came two days after India claimed it had carried out "surgical strikes" across the heavily militarized Line of Control (LoC), the de facto border in the disputed territory, on what it called "terrorist" targets several kilometers (miles) inside Pakistan-controlled Kashmir.
The rare public admission of such action sparked furious rhetoric from Pakistan and calls for restraint from the UN, Iran and the US.
Tensions between the two rivals have been boiling after the Indian government slammed Pakistan-based militants for launching an assault on an army base in Kashmir earlier this month that killed 18 soldiers.
India and Pakistan have fought three wars since they gained independence from Britain seven decades ago, two of them over the disputed Himalayan region of Kashmir.
