Pakistan has strongly rejected a claim by India that its forces have killed seven Pakistani soldiers along the so-called Line of Control (LoC).
Pakistan’s army spokesman Lieutenant General Asim Bajwa said in a message posted on Twitter on Friday that the Indian “claim of hitting or killing any” Pakistani soldier “with firing at anytime of today” along the LoC, the de facto border in the disputed territory of Kashmir, was “absolutely false.”
Earlier in the day, India's Border Security Force, also known as the BSF, said Pakistani Rangers had targeted Indian positions with sniper fire, following an attempt by militants overnight to enter the Indian side in Hira Nagar near the main city of Jammu in Indian-controlled Kashmir.
"During intermittent firing of small arms and area weapons one militant and seven Rangers were shot dead," the BSF claimed in a statement on Friday.
BSF spokesman Shubhendu Bhardwaj said Indian forces had launched an "aggressive offensive" when one of their soldiers was critically injured by sniper fire from across the border.
"There was an infiltration attempt and sniper fire. We retaliated. The bodies are on the other side of the border," said Bhardwaj.
Kashmir has been a point of dispute between India and Pakistan since their independence from the British rule in 1947. Anti-India sentiment is deeply rooted in the Muslim-majority region.
The restive region has witnessed a surge in unrest and violence since early July, when a pro-independence figure was killed in a shootout with Indian troops.
New Delhi has repeatedly accused Pakistan of arming and training militants fighting for Kashmir’s independence from India. Pakistan, however, denies the allegations.
India has deployed hundreds of thousands of Hindu troops for the suppression of any kind of socio-political voices of dissent.
To add fuel to the flames, India on September 29 claimed it had carried out “surgical” strikes in the region aimed at barring the militants allegedly from further infiltration. Pakistan denied that any such strikes had occurred, saying that there had instead been cross-border fire by India.
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