NEW DELHI: The Indian army and police launched a search operation Wednesday near Pathankot where a weekend attack on an air force base left seven soldiers dead, after villagers complained about two suspicious men in the area.

The search was focused in Gurdaspur district in the northern state of Punjab.

“The local villagers informed us about two suspicious men in army fatigues close to the army cantonment area,” Gurpreet Singh Toor, senior superintendent of Gurdaspur police, told AFP.

“We have since launched a search operation along with the army in that area. We haven’t yet come up with anything yet but the search is still on,” he added.

Indian security agencies have been on a high alert since the attack over the weekend on the air base by six gunmen.

All the attackers were killed in the two days of gunbattles.

An alliance of Kashmiri militant groups claimed the deadly attack in a statement released on Monday adding that the attack was a message to India that Kashmiri fighters could strike at any sensitive installation across India.

Indian security officials suspect the gunmen – all six of whom were killed – belonged to the Pakistan-based Jaish-e-Mohammed, the group that staged a 2001 attack on the Indian parliament which brought the two countries to the brink of war.

Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif assured his Indian counterpart Narendra Modi on Tuesday that Islamabad would not hesitate to take “prompt and decisive action” if the involvement of Pakistan-based elements in the attack on an Indian airbase was proved beyond doubt.

The Pathankot attack coincided with a 25-hour seige near an Indian consulate in Afghanistan that left at least one policeman dead and 11 others wounded.

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