2 days after Uri, 2 infiltration bids in Kashmir foiled

Uri/New Delhi, Sep 20: Two infiltration bids were made from across the border in Kashmir today but army foiled the attempts killing some of the terrorists while losing a jawan, barely two days after the terror attack in Uri.

The attempts to cross the Line of Control(LoC) in Uri and Nowgam sectors came even as Pakistani troops violated ceasefire and fired at Indian positions in Uri sector.

"Two infiltration bids by militants from across the Line of Control(LoC) have been foiled in Uri and Nowgam sectors today. At both places the operations are in progress," an army spokesman said in Srinagar.

The spokesman refused to comment on the number of militants killed in the ongoing operations so far, saying details will be made public in due course. He, however, said one soldier was killed in the operation in Nowgam sector.

Army sources in Delhi which had initially put the number of terrorists killed at 10 later clarified that the extent of casualties can be ascertained only after the retrieval of the bodies from the dense jungles and that the operations were still underway.

The sources said a group of 15 terrorists had attempted to infiltrate into Indian territory through the LoC. As the Government mulled various options on India's response to the cross-border terror attack on Sunday in which 18 jawans were killed, a crucial meeting of the Cabinet Committee on Security(CCS) has been convened tomorrow.

On the ceasefire violation incident, an army official in Srinagar said the firing from across the LoC took place between 1.10 pm and 1.30 pm. However, there was no damage in the incident, he said.

"Pakistani troops resorted to unprovoked firing by small arms towards Indian positions in Uri sector this afternoon," the official said in Srinagar, amid reports that the firing took place apparently to give cover to terrorists trying to sneak into the Indian territory.

The official said while there were no reports of any casualty in the firing, further details of the incident were awaited. Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh again reviewed the security situation in Jammu and Kashmir at a meeting in Delhi with top officials, including NSA Ajit Doval and Foreign Secretary S Jaishankar.

Separately, Union Minister of State for Home Kiren Rijiju said that any action against terrorists based in Pakistan will be taken only after examining all relevant issues. The infiltration bids and the ceasefire violation came two days after four militants of Pakistan-based terror outfit Jaish-e-Mohammad stormed an army base in Uri Sector, killing 18 soldiers and injuring several others. All the four militants were also killed.

At the meeting convened by Rajnath Singh, Doval and top officials of the ministries of Home and Defence, paramilitary forces and chiefs of intelligence agencies briefed him on the prevailing situation in the Kashmir Valley as well as along the LoC, official sources said.

PTI