Refuting the allegations levelled by Pakistan that India targeted religious places in the first phase of Operation Sindoor on the intervening night of May 6-7, Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri said Pakistan launched a full-blown attack on the Sikh community by attacking a gurudwara based in Poonch and killing three people from the community.
During a Ministry of External Affairs’ (MEA) press briefing on Thursday, calling Pakistan a hub of global terrorism, Misri said the neighbouring country’s reputation as the epicenter of global terrorism is rooted in a number of instances. “I don’t need to remind where Osama Bin Laden was found and who called him a martyr. Pakistan is also home to a large number of UN-proscribed terrorists and also to terrorists proscribed by many countries. You must have seen in the last few days, their defence minister and former foreign minister accepted their country’s involvement with such terror groups,” he added.
Questioning the presence of Pakistan’s top military brass at the funeral of “civilians” killed in the counter offensive launched by India, Misri said it was also odd that funerals of civilians are being carried out by coffins wrapped in their national flag, and state honours are being awarded. Misri said, flashing a picture of the funeral.
Responding to Pakistan’s claim that civilians were targeted on May 7, the foreign secretary said, “We have made it very clear that the attacks were against terrorist infrastructure. If only civilians, if any civilians were killed in these attacks, I wonder what message this picture actually sends to all of you. This is a question that is worth asking. It’s also odd that the funerals of civilians are carried out with the coffins being draped in Pakistani flags and state honours being about it. As far as we are concerned the individual’s eliminated at these facilities were terrorists, giving terrorists state funerals, maybe a practice in Pakistan. Doesn’t seem to make much sense to us.”
The funeral in question was attended by Pakistan Army personnel, police, civil officials, and members of the banned Jamaat-ud-Dawah (JuD), founded by Hafiz Saeed.
Dubbing the April 22 Pahalgam massacre as the original escalation from Pakistan, Misri said the Indian Armed Forces responded to that escalation yesterday. “What is interesting is that when talks on Pahalgam were ongoing at the UNSC, guess which country opposed the TRF’s mention? It was Pakistan. India’s response is non-escalatory, precise, and measured. Our intention is not to escalate matters, and we are only responding to the escalation. No military targets have been selected. Only terror infrastructure has been hit,” he added.
Debunking the claims being made by Pakistan about India allegedly targeting a dam near the Neelum-Jhelum project in Pakistan-occupied Jammu and Kashmir (POJK), Misri called it “a blatant lie”. Stating that the allegations were “an absolute and complete fabrication,” Misri said that actions under Operation Sindoor were focused solely on terrorist infrastructure. “India has targeted only and only terrorist infrastructure, and the details of that infrastructure, along with the precise locations, were shared yesterday,” he said.
“If this kind of a claim is a pretext of targeting Indian infrastructure of similar nature, then Pakistan will be solely responsible for the consequences that will undoubtedly follow,” Misri warned Pakistan.
Addressing the media, Colonel Sofiya Qureshi said that in the second edition of the Operation Sindoor launched on Thursday morning Indian Armed Forces targeted Pakistan’s Air Defence Radars and systems at a number of locations. Stating that the Indian response has been in the same domain with same intensity as Pakistan, the officer said that it has been reliably learnt that an Air Defence system at Lahore has been neutralised.
Earlier, rattled by the air strikes conducted under Operation Sindoor, Pakistan launched a counter offensive on multiple defence bases located in the northern and western of the country. However, all the attempts were neutralized by the Indian Armed forces who engaged the Integrated Counter UAS Grid and Air Defence systems. “These were neutralised by the Integrated Counter UAS Grid and Air Defence systems. The debris of these attacks is now being recovered from a number of locations that prove the Pakistani attacks,” she said.
On the night of May 07-08, Pakistan attempted to engage a number of military targets in Northern and Western India including Awantipura, Srinagar, Jammu, Pathankot, Amritsar, Kapurthala, Jalandhar, Ludhiana, Adampur, Bhatinda, Chandigarh, Nal, Phalodi, Uttarlai, and Bhuj, using drones and missiles.
“Sixteen innocent lives have been lost, including three women and five children, due to Pakistani firing. Here too, India was compelled to respond to bring Mortar and Artillery fire from Pakistan to a halt. Indian Armed Forces reiterate their commitment to non-escalation, provided it is respected by the Pakistani military,” Wing Commander Vyomika Singh added towards the end.