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NEW DELHI, May 19: The Indian government on Sunday went on the warpath following a second attack on an army camp in occupied Kashmir in less than a week, announcing an increased mobilization and warning that it would match Pakistani firepower.
Foreign Minister Jaswant Singh also announced, at the end of a meeting between Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee and his security advisers, that India was reconsidering Pakistan’s Most Favoured Nation status.
Under the increased mobilization, India’s paramilitary forces operating in occupied Kashmir will be transferred from the command of the interior ministry to the army, and the coast guard will be placed under the command of the navy.
Military experts said the move would add muscle to India’s million-plus army as well as crank up the country’s war machine for rapid response in case of conflict with Pakistan.
“If any artillery fire comes on our forces from across the border then they will be immediately retaliated,” Singh said.
KASHMIR CLASHES: Fourteen people, including eight security force personnel, were killed and 17 injured in fresh Mujahideen attacks in occupied Kashmir, police said on Sunday.
They said four soldiers were killed and seven wounded when freedom fighters fired rocket-propelled grenades at a security post in the disputed region on Sunday.
The attack came less than a week after a raid by suspected Kashmiris on an army camp in occupied Kashmir killed 31 people, many of them wives and children of soldiers. The three attackers were also killed.
A freedom fighter was killed in the latest attack, which took place early on Sunday in Udhampur district of southern Kashmir.
Earlier, on Saturday night, four security force personnel were killed in two separate Mujahideen attacks in Doda and Baramulla districts of the state, police said.—AFP/Reuters
