Army raises concerns with Pak Army over targeting of civilians in ceasefire violations

The Army has raised its concerns with the Pakistan Army over the latter targeting civilian population during ceasefire violations which have significantly gone up.

The matter was raised by the Indian Army through hotline earlier this month.

"On October 1, the Indian Army held talks with the Pakistan Army over hotline. Indian Army raised the issue of Pakistan Army targeting civilian population on the Indian side along the Line of Control during ceasefire violations," Indian Army sources said.

On the issue of a situation in the Kashmir valley post abrogation of Article 370, the sources said: "Since August, 67 per cent of the agitations in the Kashmir Valley have been confined to Srinagar, while the rest mainly took place in Budgam, Pulwama and Baramulla. Very few instances took place in known terrorist hotbeds such as Anantnag, Shopian, Kupwara and Rajouri."

The number of ceasefire violations by Pakistan has gone up significantly this year compared to 2018.

"2317 ceasefire violations by Pakistan in 2019 till October 10 while 147 terrorists have been killed in different operations by the security forces on the Line of Control (LoC) and hinterland," the sources said. In 2018, the total number of ceasefire violations was 1629.

254 terrorists were killed last year including a large number of local and foreigner terrorist commanders.

Army sources also said that only 24 cases of 'terrorist-initiated incidents' were recorded in the July-September period of this year as against 114 and 31 in the corresponding periods of 2018 and 2017 respectively.