MUZAFFARABAD, Jan 14: Firing by Indian troops injured another civilian in Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK) on Monday as the region condemned ceasefire violations from across the Line of Control (LoC) through rallies and demonstrations, officials and witnesses said.
Abrar Ahmed, 28, was hit by a bullet fired from across the LoC in Darra Sher Khan village of Batal sector, deputy commissioner of Poonch district Sohail Azam told Dawn by telephone.
Indian troops began firing at about 2pm and intermittently continued it for two hours, he said. However, no further casualty was reported. On Saturday, a student of class nine was injured when he was hit by shrapnel in the same village while going home from a tuition centre.
Sources said the latest incident came hardly two hours after military commanders of Pakistan and India held a flag meeting at Tetrinote-Chakan da Bagh crossing point in the first on-ground contact between the two armies after tensions mounted along the LoC on Jan 6.
No details are available about the meeting which, according to an Indian TV channel, lasted for 35 minutes.
Condemning unprovoked and unrelenting incidents of ceasefire violations, people staged rallies and demonstrations in different parts of the AJK, blaming India for “deliberate attempts to disturb peace and tranquillity along the LoC”.
“Indian political and military leadership is bent upon vitiating peace along the LoC through ceasefire violations,” said AJK Prime Minister Chaudhry Abdul Majeed at a public meeting in Muzaffarabad.
The meeting was presided over by the president of the opposition Muslim Conference, Sardar Attique Ahmed Khan.
“People of Kashmir stand by the armed forces of Pakistan and cannot be frightened by cowardly attacks from across the LoC,” Mr Majeed said.
He said the freedom struggle in Indian-held Kashmir was indigenous and there was a consensus among the AJK leadership over the liberation issue.
Alluding to the long march of Dr Tahirul Qadri, Mr Majeed said that at a time when Pakistan was faced with various challenges “conspiracy by an individual to derail democracy” was condemnable.
“The march and the ceasefire violations seem to be parts of a conspiracy,” he said.
Sardar Attique accused Indian army of being averse to the peace process between India and Pakistan “which is evident from its misadventures along the LoC”.
After the US withdrawal from Afghanistan, he warned, Afghan militants could move to the ‘battleground of Kashmir’ if Kashmir issue was not resolved peacefully. “And we will not oppose their ingress into our territory,” he said.
Later, the participants of the gathering marched to the office of the UN Military Observers Group in India and Pakistan near the confluence of Neelum and Jhelum rivers.
They were raising pro-freedom and anti-India slogans. A banner carried by them read: “Violation of ceasefire is a threat to global peace.”
At the UN mission, Mr Majeed and Mr Khan delivered a memorandum, which called for constitution of a UN commission to investigate recent ceasefire violations by Indian army.
In Mirpur, people took out a procession from the district courts to Chowk-i-Shaheedan. They raised slogans against unprovoked shelling by Indian troops.
Similar rallies were organised in Bhimber, Rawalakot, Kotli and other towns.