MUZAFFARABAD/NEWDELHI: Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan vowed to "fight until theend" against any Indian aggression in the disputed region of Kashmir. Thewarning represented a dramatic escalation in rhetoric after Islamabad said lastweek that they had ruled out a "military option" over the Kashmirdispute. The remarks come as tensions skyrocketed between the nuclear-armedrivals following India's surprising move to revoke the autonomy of its portionof the disputed Himalayan territory last week.
"ThePakistani army has solid information that they (India) are planning to dosomething in Pakistani Kashmir, and they are ready and will give a solidresponse," Khan said during a televised speech in Muzaffarabad, capital ofPakistan-administered Kashmir. "We have decided that if India commits anytype of violation we will fight until the end," Khan added in the speechmarking the country's Independence Day. "The time has arrived to teach youa lesson."
The head of thePakistani military also added that the country's security forces were"fully ready to perform its part in line with our national duty forKashmir cause", according to a tweet from the army's spokesperson. Khanand the military's comments followed other fiery speeches in the territory'sparliament, with the prime minister of Pakistani Kashmir at one point beggingfor permission to cross the de-facto border dividing the territory and thenlater bragging about opening fire on Indian troops in the past.
The heatedrhetoric follows days of rising hostilities from Islamabad. Following Delhi'smove to abolish Indian-administered Kashmir's special status, Pakistan launcheda diplomatic offensive aimed at reversing the order and formally asked theUnited Nations Security Council late Tuesday to hold an emergency session toaddress India's "illegal actions". Pakistan has also expelled theIndian ambassador, halted bilateral trade and suspended cross-border transportservices. However, analysts said the actions were unlikely to move Delhi.
The Indian partof the picturesque Himalayan state has been under lockdown for over a week withtens of thousands of troop reinforcements deployed to the main city of Srinagarand other towns and villages. A curfew has also been enforced across the regionand phone and Internet lines cut to quell potential unrest. Indian authoritiesvowed to reduce the restrictions on freedom of movement in their portion ofKashmir following the country's own Independence Day celebrations on Thursday.
Earlier this weekKhan lambasted the international community for failing to challenge India andsaid turning a blind eye to the spread of Indian Hindu nationalism was the sameas appeasing Hitler - a comparison he again made yesterday. As tensionssimmered with India, Pakistan moved ahead with independence celebrations whichbegan at the stroke of midnight with firework shows lighting up the skies inmajor cities, where residents jammed the streets waving the national flag fromtheir cars and motorcycles.
In August 1947the British Raj was dismantled with the subcontinent divided into twoindependent states - Hindu-majority India and Muslim-majority Pakistan.Millions were uprooted in one of the largest mass migrations in history, withexperts estimating at least one million died in the communal violence unleashedby a partition that continues to haunt the subcontinent to this day.
Kashmir has beendivided between India and Pakistan ever since, and has been the spark for twomajor wars and countless clashes between the two nuclear-armed arch-rivals.Earlier this year they came close to all-out conflict yet again, after amilitant attack in Indian-held Kashmir in February was claimed by a group basedin Pakistan, igniting tit-for-tat air strikes.
Meanwhile,India's crippling 10-day-old curfew in Kashmir will ease after today, accordingto the state governor, but phone lines and the Internet will remain cut. Indiashut off communications and severely restricted movement in the part of Kashmirit controls on Aug 4, a day before New Delhi stripped the Muslim-majorityregion of its autonomy. Fearing protests and unrest in the long-restive region,tens of thousands of extra Indian troops have been deployed, turning thepicturesque main city of Srinagar into a warren of barbed wire and barricades.
While rules onthe movement of people would be eased after India's Independence Daycelebrations today, state governor Satya Pal Malik said that phone lines andthe Internet would remain down. "We don't want to give that instrument tothe enemy until things settle down," Malik told the Times of India."In a week or 10 days, everything will be alright and we will graduallyopen lines of communication."
The lockdown hasnot completely prevented anger at Prime Minister Narendra Modi's move burstingout into the open, however. According to residents around 8,000 peopleprotested after Friday prayers, with security forces firing tear gas andpellet-firing shotguns to break up the rally. Only on Tuesday did the Indiangovernment confirm that clashes, blaming them on stone-throwing"miscreants" and saying its forces reacted with"restraint".
Footage filmed byAFP on Monday showed hundreds of people protesting in the Soura area ofSrinagar, shouting slogans such as "We want freedom" and "Indiago back" as helicopters buzzed overhead. "What India has done isunacceptable to us. Our struggle will continue even if India keeps Kashmirlocked down for months," one protester told AFP. India's home ministrysaid Tuesday that since the curfew was imposed, "no bullets have beenfired".
But Munir Khan, asenior police officer in Kashmir, said that the military has used pellet-firingshotguns. "There have been 2-3 pellet injuries but they are nothing major.There is nothing grave," Khan told AFP. He added that some securitypersonnel were also injured. In Srinagar's main SMHS Hospital, one young manwas nursing his eye, saying he had been shot by pellets fired by soldiers as hecame out of a mosque on Monday. "We could not pray in peace on the day ofEid. A large number of soldiers surrounded the mosque," a man by hisbedside said, also declining to give his name.
Elsewhere in theward, six-year-old Munefa Nazir slept with her right eye bandaged as her familytook turns waving a handheld fan to keep her cool. According to her uncle, shewas shot in the eye by a marble fired from a catapult by an Indian soldier at acheckpoint as they rode on his scooter on Monday evening. "She screamedand blood from her eye started oozing through her fingers as she covered herface with both hands," Farooq Ahmad said.
The 1,000-bedSMHS is usually busy but because of the curfew only a few beds were occupied insome sections. Many pharmacies have also run out of some supplies. "Wehave run out of a lot of prescription drugs people here look for," saidMubashir Hussain, a salesman at a medical shop in the Jawahar Nagar area whererestrictions on public and vehicular movement have been eased since Monday. -Agencies