Indian jets crossed into Pakistani territory on Tuesday, conducting what one minister said was an air strike on “terror camps”, dramatically escalating tensions between the nuclear-armed neighbours who have fought three wars against each other.
The confrontation follows a growing rift between the arch-foes since a Feb. 14 suicide bombing in the disputed Kashmir region, claimed by a Pakistani-based militant group, killed at least 40 Indian paramilitary police. New Delhi blamed Islamabad, which denies having a role in the attack.
Pakistan downplayed Tuesday’s incident, saying there were no casualties and that Indian jets “released a payload” hastily in a forest area after crossing Kashmir’s Line of Control (LoC), which acts as a de facto border between the two countries.
“Air Force carried out aerial strike early morning today at terror camps across the LoC (Line of Control) and Completely destroyed it,” India’s minister of state for agriculture, Gajendra Singh Shekhawat, said on Twitter.
Pakistan’s military confirmed Indian aircraft violated its airspace but said “no infrastructure got hit”.
“Indian aircrafts intruded from Muzafarabad sector,” Pakistani military spokesman Major General Asif Ghafoor said on Twitter early on Tuesday, referring to an area in the Pakistan-administered part of Kashmir.
Ghafoor said “facing timely and effective response from Pakistan Air Force”, the Indian aircraft “released payload in haste while escaping which fell near Balakot. No casualties or damage”.
Ghafoor, saying that more information would be released, tweeted four pictures of the alleged site where Indian aircraft dropped a payload near Balakot, purportedly showing a bomb crater in a forest area but no serious damage.
Balakot, a town in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province in Pakistan, is about 50 km (30 miles) from the Line of Control (LoC) in Kashmir, which was the cause of two of the three wars India and Pakistan have fought since the end of British colonial rule in 1947.
Analysts have alleged Pakistani militants have their training camps in the area, although Pakistan has always denied the presence of any such camps.