ISLAMABAD/NEW DELHI, 31 May — Conflict escalated sharply yesterday along the Indian-Pakistani borders as Islamabad began a military reinforcement and militants attacked a Kashmiri police post, killing three policemen before being gunned down after a 17-hour firefight. The Indian Army reported the heaviest shelling since relations between the hostile neighbors plummeted two weeks ago following a massacre in Kashmir India blames on Pakistan, with the town of Poonch overnight becoming the main flash point.
Pakistan’s military, meanwhile, said that troops had been redeployed from its western border with Afghanistan to the eastern flank with India. The military said in a statement read out on state television that the redeployment from the Afghan frontier was made “in view of the adverse posture of the Indian armed forces”.
Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf then appeared to deny the military’s statement, saying only that a troop deployment was under serious consideration. But officials said Musharraf was referring to front-line troops on the Afghan border, which may be thinned out later if the tensions with India worsen.
An Indian Army spokesman said India was aware of the troop movements across the border, amid US warnings that “irresponsible elements” in the two nuclear-armed countries could spark a war. “We are in full knowledge of the situation and Pakistani troop and tank mobilization,” spokesman Col. Sruti Kant told reporters. “We are in complete control of the situation.”
Kant said India had information that the Pakistani troops were being moved to areas flanking India’s western border states of Rajasthan and Punjab, the theater of previous wars between the two archrivals.
Musharraf said war between India and Pakistan would only break out if India initiates the conflict. “We will try to avoid a conflict. Conflict will only take place if it is initiated by India,” he said at a press conference after signing an agreement on an energy pipeline with the leaders of Afghanistan and Turkmenistan.
A defense spokesman in Jammu, southern Kashmir, said heavy shelling, mortar and gunfire had raged across the Indian-Pakistani borders overnight into the day. At least seven people were killed in a fierce artillery duel in Poonch district that continued deep into the night, Indian police said.
In Washington, President George W. Bush — just back from a trip to Germany, Russia, France and Italy — said he was sending Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld to the India-Pakistan region next week as part of US efforts to resolve the standoff.
Bush also told reporters Rumsfeld and US Secretary of State Colin Powell were studying ways to “protect American lives” in the region if necessary. “We are making it very clear to both Pakistan and India that war will not serve their interest,” he said as he met his Cabinet in the White House.
