Pakistan says shot down 25 drones; India says it pushed back Pakistani retaliation
Pakistan said on Thursday it shot down 25 drones from India in its airspace while India said it 'neutralized' Pakistan's attempts to strike military targets with drones and missiles, as fighting spread between the nuclear-armed neighbours.
The latest exchanges come a day after India said it hit 'terrorist infrastructure' in Pakistan in the early hours of Wednesday – two weeks after it accused the Islamic nation of involvement in an attack in Indian Kashmir in which 26 people – mostly Hindu tourists – were killed.
Islamabad had denied the accusation and vowed to retaliate to the missile strikes, also saying it shot down five Indian aircraft. The Indian embassy in Beijing termed reports of fighter jets being shot down as 'misinformation'.
Pakistan shot down 25 Israeli-made drones from India at multiple locations, including the two largest cities of Karachi and Lahore, and their debris is being collected, Pakistan military spokesperson Ahmed Sharif Chaudhry said.
One drone was also shot down over the garrison city of Rawalpindi, home to the Pakistan army's heavily fortified headquarters, he said.
One drone hit a military target near Lahore and four personnel of the Pakistan army were injured in this attack, Chaudhry said.
'Indian drones continue to be sent into Pakistan airspace...(India) will continue to pay dearly for this naked aggression,' he said.
Explainer: What to know about Kashmir, the Himalayan region at the heart of India-Pakistan tensions
The Indian defence ministry said Pakistan attempted to engage a number of military targets in northern and western India on Wednesday night and early Thursday and they were 'neutralized' by Indian air defence systems.
In response, Indian forces targeted air defence radars and systems at a number of locations in Pakistan on Thursday, it said in a statement, adding that the 'Indian response has been in the same domain with the same intensity as Pakistan'.
Pakistan also increased the intensity of its firing across the ceasefire line, the de facto border, in Kashmir and 16 people, including five children and three women, were killed on the Indian side, the statement said.
The relationship between India and Pakistan has been fraught with tension since they gained independence from colonial Britain in 1947, and the countries have fought three wars, two of them over Kashmir, and clashed countless times.
Both acquired nuclear weapons in the 1990s.
Trading was halted on Pakistan's benchmark share index after the index slumped 6.3 per cent on news of the drone attacks. Indian equities, rupee and bonds fell sharply in late afternoon trading after the Indian defence ministry statement.
Pakistan says at least 31 of its civilians were killed and about 50 wounded in Wednesday's strikes and in cross-border shelling across the frontier in Kashmir that followed, while India says 13 of its civilians died and 59 were wounded.
On Thursday, Indian government ministers told a meeting of political parties in New Delhi that the strikes on Pakistan had killed over 100 terrorists and that the count was still ongoing, government sources said.
In the Kashmir valley, the cable car in Gulmarg, a major tourist attraction, was shut due to its proximity to the border with Pakistan. A hotel manager there who did not want to be named said police had ordered the hotel vacated on Wednesday night.
Blackout drills were conducted in India's border regions on Wednesday night.
Local media reported panic buying in some cities in the Indian state of Punjab which shares a border with Pakistan, as people hoarded essentials fearing a Pakistani retaliation to the Indian strikes.
Pakistan's aviation authority 'temporarily suspended' flight operations at airports in Lahore, Karachi, and the northeastern city of Sialkot until noon (0700 GMT). It did not give a reason for the suspension.
Although Pakistan's federal government has pledged to respond to India's strikes, Defence Minister Khawaja Muhammad Asif told The New York Times on Wednesday that Pakistan was ready to de-escalate.
Indian Foreign Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar said New Delhi did not intend to escalate the situation. 'However, if there are military attacks on us, there should be no doubt that it will be met with a very, very firm response,' he said at a India-Iran Joint Commission Meeting.
With India saying it would 'respond' if Pakistan 'responds', global powers have urged a calming of tensions. U.S. President Donald Trump said on Wednesday he hoped the countries could 'work it out', adding he 'will be there' if he can help.
China urged both countries to act in the larger interest of peace and stability, with the Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson saying that Beijing was ready to work with the international community 'to avoid actions that further complicate the situation'.
Russia and the U.S. have also urged restraint.
The current escalation comes at a precarious time for Pakistan's $350-billion economy, which is still recovering from an economic crisis that brought it to the brink of defaulting on external debt obligations in 2023 before it secured funding from the International Monetary Fund (IMF).
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