ANI / Wednesday, January 9, 2013 16:38 IST
Soldiers and officers of the Indian Army paid their tribute to two jawans who were martyred in an encounter with Pakistan soldiers in Jammu and Kashmir.
The body of one of the soldiers was found 'badly mutilated' in a forested area along the Line of Control (LoC)
Earlier in the day, India summoned Pakistan's High Commissioner to New Delhi, Salman Bashir to register a protest over the killing of two soldiers.
Giving details, Deputy General Officer commanding (GOC) Brigadier, J.K. Tiwari confirmed firing from the Pakistani side.
"Our area domination patrol vehicle was travelling from one post to another along the Line of Control (LOC). Midway, there was unprovoked firing from across the border for over half an hour. There was fire exchange and it subsided. Two of our scouts were found dead during search operation," said Brigadier Tiwari on Wednesday (January 09).
Firing and small skirmishes between the two countries are common along the 740-km (460-mile) LoC despite a ceasefire and slowly improving bilateral ties. The Indian army says eight of its soldiers were killed in 2012, in 75 incidents.
However, incursions by troops from either side are rare, and one media report said Tuesday's (January 08) incident marked the 'first major ingress' since the ceasefire was agreed in 2003.
Pakistan has denied the latest Indian allegations. A Pakistani military spokesman said they were "propaganda" aimed at diverting attention away from a clash along the LoC two days earlier in which Pakistan had said one of its soldiers was killed after an Indian incursion.
India denies that its troops crossed over the line during last weekend's incident.
URL of the article: http://www.dnaindia.com/india/report_indian-army-pays-tribute-to-martyred-soldiers_1787276-all
Pak troops kill two jawans, behead, mutilate one of them
By Rajat Pandit & Josy Joseph, TNN | Jan 9, 2013, 12.57 AM IST
NEW DELHI: An Indian soldier was beheaded and another killed by Pakistani troops after they crossed over into Indian territory in the Mendhar sector of Jammu & Kashmir on Tuesday, in a grim reminder of the brutality perpetrated during the 1999 Kargil conflict which can make peace making even more difficult.
The "border action team" of the Pakistani Army took advantage of the thick fog in the thickly-forested mountainous region to sneak 500 to 600 metres across the Line of Control (loC) before they were driven back after a fierce gun-battle and even close-quarter combat with Indian troops that went on for over 30 minutes shortly before noon on Tuesday.
The incursion and ceasefire violation seemed to be a diversionary manoeuvre to push infiltrators into J&K, as has been the earlier practice of Pakistani Army. However, it met with adequate fire-power from the Indian troops who, tipped off by the Intelligence Bureau, were fully alert to thwart any nefarious design.
After the gun battle, the bodies of Lance-Naiks Hemraj and Sudhakar Singh, part of an "area domination patrol" of the 13 Rajputana Rifles, were found. One of them was badly "mutilated". Although the Army did not give more details of the barbarism, sources said the retreating Pakistani soldiers had chopped off the "head" of one of the Indian soldiers and taken it back with them.
An outraged Indian Army dubbed the crime "yet another grave provocation" by the Pakistan Army, and said that it would be "taken up sternly through official channels". Given the gravity of the situation, PM Manmohan Singh, who was in Kochi in the afternoon, was briefed over the phone.
"We condemn the provocative action. The government will take up the incident with the Pakistan government. We expect Islamabad to honour the ceasefire agreement (which came into force in November 2003) strictly," said the defence ministry.
Predictably, the Pakistan military denied its troops had crossed over into India or indulged in a ceasefire violation on Tuesday. "It looks like Indian propaganda to divert world attention from the raid conducted by Indian troops on one of our posts on Sunday, in which one of our soldiers was killed," it said.
But the decapitation of the Indian soldier on Tuesday evoked memories of the barbaric way in which during the 1999 Kargil conflict Captain Saurabh Kalia was tortured by his Pakistani captors who later handed over his badly mutilated body to India. Kalia's father is still fighting to get Pakistan to punish the soldiers who were responsible for his son's brutal torture.
The defeat in Kargil did not chasten the Pakistani security establishment into mending its ways and stop violating the Geneva Convention which lays down how captured soldiers should be treated. In February, 2000, infamous Pakistani terrorist and al-Qaida member Ilyas Kashmiri had led a raid on the Indian Army's "Ashok Listening Post" in the Nowshera sector to kill seven Indian soldiers.
Even then, Kashmiri had taken back to Pakistan the head of a 24-year-old Indian jawan, Bhausaheb Maruti Talekar of the 17 Maratha Light Infantry, as a trophy to brandish. He is believed to have been honoured by General Pervez Musharraf himself at a ceremony later.
On Tuesday, the defence ministry said the director-general of military operations (DGMO), Lt-General Vinod Bhatia, had already taken up the issue "directly" with his Pakistani counterpart. With the PM landing back in New Delhi later on Tuesday, the ministry of external affairs is likely to summon a top Pakistani official on Wednesday to lodge a strong protest over the matter.
Sources said Army chief General Bikram Singh also briefed national security advisor Shivshankar Menon on the "significant escalation" in ceasefire violations by the Pakistan Army in recent days. "Pakistan Army is regularly giving covering fire to help terrorists infiltrate into J&K, especially in the Rajouri, Uri and Keran sectors. If there were 61 such violations in 2011, as many as 120 have been recorded in the last one year," said an official.
India has already denied Pakistan's earlier allegation on Sunday, holding that it was actually Pakistani soldiers who opened "unprovoked heavy machinegun and mortar fire on Indian post in the Uri sector". Indian troops had just responded to it "in a calibrated manner". The external affairs ministry also asked Pakistan to ensure that the "sanctity of the LoC is maintained".
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/Pak-troops-kill-two-jawans-behead-mutilate-one-of-them/articleshow/17945868.cms
Hindu soldiers beheaded, body of one mutilated by Jihadi Pak troops…
Video link: http://youtu.be/c5MgBG_mukw
India strongly reacts on LoC killings, tells Pakistan to 'immediately probe and respond'
Agencies
New Delhi, January 09, 2013
ndia on Wednesday summoned the Pakistan high commissioner to convey a "strong protest" over the Pakistani Army action in which two Indian soldiers were killed and their bodies subjected to "barbaric and inhuman mutilation" in Jammu and Kashmir. Pakistan high commissioner Salman Bashir
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was summoned by foreign secretary Ranjan Mathai, who made it clear that these incidents were "unacceptable" and that Pakistan has to uphold the sanctity of the Line of Control, according to official sources.
During the 30-minute meeting, Bashir was told by Mathai that regular Pakistani soldiers had crossed the LoC at Mendhar sector and engaged with Indian troops who were patrolling this sector.
"Two Indian soldiers were killed in the attack and their bodies subjected to barbaric and inhuman mutilation. The government of Pakistan was asked to immediately investigate these actions that are in contravention of international conduct and ensure that these will not recur," Bashir was told.
Promising that New Delhi's response would be "proportionate", foreign minister Salman Khurshid said late Tuesday that senior government and military officials would decide on Wednesday a course of action over the "ghastly" incident.
In a first step, his ministry summoned Pakistani's High Commissioner (ambassador) Salman Bashir to lodge a complaint about the clash, which has dealt a blow to peace efforts between the nuclear-armed neighbours who have fought three wars since independence.
"The Pakistan envoy has been summoned to meet with the foreign secretary," ministry spokesman Syed Akbaruddin said.
The Pakistani army's treatment of two Indian soldiers who were killed along the border in Kashmir was "inhuman", defence minister AK Antony said on Wednesday.
"Pakistan army's action is highly provocative. The way they treated the dead body of the soldiers, Indian soldiers, is inhuman," he said after reports and military sources said one of the troops had been beheaded on Tuesday.
"We will convey our protest to the Pakistan government and our DGMO (director general of military operations) will talk to his counterpart in Pakistan. They are closely monitoring the situation," he told reporters.
Indian authorities said the body of one of the soldiers was "badly mutilated," while newspapers and a military source speaking to AFP indicated that he had been decapitated.
Army's Additional Director General (Public Information) Major General S L Narasimhan said Northern Army Commander Lt Gen K T Parnaik had visited the scene of action and confirmed that one of the two bodies was mutilated.
The bodies of both men have been brought to an army hospital in Rajouri in Jammu and Kashmir where a post-mortem will confirm the extent of their injuries and whether one of them was beheaded, army spokesman Rajesh Kalia said.
One of the sergeants is from Uttar Pradesh, while the other is from the central state of Madhya Pradesh, he added.
"Pakistan army's action is highly provocative. The way they treated the dead body of the soldiers, Indian soldiers, is inhuman," Defence Minister AK Antony told reporters on Wednesday.
Khurshid said the attack, which followed a deadly exchange along the border at the weekend in which a Pakistani soldier was killed, was designed to wreck an already fragile peace process.
Relations had been slowly improving over the past few years following a rupture after the 2008 attacks on Mumbai, which were blamed by India on Pakistan-based militants.
In Islamabad a Pakistan military spokesman denied what he called an "Indian allegation of unprovoked firing", calling the Indian account of Tuesday's clash "propaganda to divert the attention of the world from Sunday's raid on a Pakistani post".
Pakistan's army says Indian troops crossed the Line of Control on Sunday and stormed a military post in an attack that left a Pakistani soldier dead and another injured. India has denied crossing the line.
India denied crossing the line, but a foreign ministry spokesman said Indian troops had undertaken "controlled retaliation" on Sunday after "unprovoked firing" that damaged a civilian home.
"What will be done, in which manner, is something we will take a call on tomorrow," Khurshid, facing his first crisis since assuming the job in late October, told the NDTV news channel on Tuesday.
"It is absolutely unacceptable, ghastly, and really, really terrible and extremely short-sighted by their part," he added.
The clash took place in Mendhar sector, 173 kilometres (107 miles) west of the city of Jammu, the winter capital of the state.
Army sources said there had been further exchanges along the de facto border on Tuesday night which caused no damage and the border was calm on Wednesday morning.
"The Line of Control is steady and stable," Brigadier GS Sangha, one of the army's most senior officers in Kashmir, told AFP.
The two Indian soldiers died after a firefight broke out around noon as a patrol moving in foggy conditions discovered Pakistani troops about half a kilometre (1,600 feet) inside Indian territory, an army spokesman said.
A ceasefire has been in place along the Line of Control that divides the countries since 2003, but it is periodically violated by Pakistani troops.
"We lost two soldiers and one of them has been badly mutilated," he added, declining to give more details on the injuries.
"The intruders were regular (Pakistani) soldiers and they were 400-500 metres (1,300-1,600 feet) inside our territory," he said of the clash in Mendhar sector, 173 kilometres (107 miles) west by road from the city of Jammu.
Reports and a military source speaking to AFP indicated that the mutilated soldier may have been decapitated, but further investigations and a post-mortem were required to confirm this.
Speaking on television late on Tuesday, Khurshid described the killings as "inhuman" and "not the way civilised people deal with each other".
"We need to do something about this and we will, but it has to be done after careful consideration of all the details in consultation with the defence ministry," Khurshid told the NDTV news channel.
"What will be done, in which manner, is something we will take a call on tomorrow (Wednesday)." Khurshid.
"It is absolutely unacceptable, ghastly, and really, really terrible and extremely short-sighted by their part," he added, promising that the response would be "proportionate".
"This seems like a clear attempt to derail the dialogue," he added. "We have to find ways in which the dialogue is not sabotaged or destroyed."
Relations between the neighbours had been slowly improving over the last few years following a rupture in their slow-moving peace process after the 2008 attacks on Mumbai, which were blamed by India on Pakistan-based militants.
The deaths deal a serious blow to efforts to ease tension in South Asia and improve diplomatic relations. Steps such as opening up trade and offering more lenient visa regimes have been a feature of recent high-level talks.
(With inputs from PTI, IANS, AFP)
http://www.hindustantimes.com/india-news/newdelhi/india-strongly-reacts-on-loc-killings-tells-pak-to-immediately-investigate-and-respond/article1-986997.aspx