Shadow Correspondent
Jammu, Feb 21 :
The Indian and Pakistani armies on Friday held a flag meeting along the Line of Control (LoC) in Jammu and Kashmir’s Poonch district, defence sources said. The meeting aimed to reduce the increasing tension following recent incidents of alleged cease-fire violations, including firing and IED attacks, they said.
The brigade-commander-level meeting took place in the Chakkan-Da-Bagh crossing point area, and both sides agreed to maintain peace along the borders as per the ceasefire agreement of 2021, according to sources. The 75-minute-long meeting started around 11 am and was held in a congenial atmosphere, said officials, adding that the discussions were “friendly” but didn’t further details.
Quoting sources, PTI reported that the Indian side delegation lodged a “strong protest” over the recent “unprovoked” cross-border firing incidents, “infiltration attempts by terrorists” and “smuggling of narcotics and weapons.
The ceasefire violations along the borders of Jammu and Kashmir have been rare since the two countries renewed an agreement on February 25, 2021, but, soldiers from both sides traded gunfire recently, and a land mine blast killed two Indian troops earlier this month.
Two army personnel were also injured in separate incidents of small arms firing from across the LoC in Rajouri and Poonch districts on February 10 and 14, while two more army personnel were injured in separate landmine explosions in Poonch in the past week.
The extent of damage on the Pakistan side in the retaliatory action was not known immediately, but the officials said the enemy forces also suffered “heavy casualties”, PTI reported.
The army and the security forces have been maintaining high vigilance on the LoC and the hinterland because the traditional infiltration routes have remained open this winter due to scant snowfall in Jammu and Kashmir.
Union Home Minister Amit Shah chaired two security review meetings on J&K recently, and he directed the forces to ensure zero infiltration and zero tolerance for terrorists.
Lieutenant Governor Manoj Sinha also chaired two security meetings recently, one in Srinagar and the other in Jammu. He asked the police and the security forces to dismantle the terror ecosystem by targeting terrorists, their overground workers (OGWs), and sympathisers.
