A Kashmiri boy, wounded in cross-border firing, receives medical treatment at a hospital in Muzaffarabad on Friday. Agence France-Presse

Tariq Butt

The Indian army earlier this week used cluster ammunition to target the civilian population in Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK) across the Line of Control (LoC) in violation of the Geneva Convention and international law, the Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR) said on Saturday.

In a statement, the ISPR said the Indian military on the night of July 30-31 targeted innocent citizens including women and children in Neelum Valley through artillery using cluster ammunition. The attack left two civilians, including a 4-year-old boy, dead and 11 others were critically injured.

“This is a violation of Geneva Convention and international humanitarian law,” the ISPR said, adding that the use of cluster ammunition is prohibited under the Convention on Cluster Ammunition because of its severe impact on non-combatants.

Dropped from planes or fired from artillery, cluster bombs explode in mid-air, scattering bomblets, with many civilians getting killed or maimed by their indiscriminate, wide-area effect. They also pose a lasting threat as many bomblets fail to explode on impact.

Speaking to a local news channel regarding the development, Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi said he had feared that some forces would play the role of “spoilers” in view of the worsening situation in Indian-occupied Kashmir and as the Afghan peace talks entered a “critical stage.”

He said India was “in a state of panic” following US President Donald Trump’s offer to mediate the Kashmir dispute and Prime Minister Imran Khan’s successful visit to Washington. “I fear that [India] is in search of a false-flag operation [...] which it can use to again point fingers at Pakistan,” the foreign minister added.

Qureshi said he had expressed similar concerns in a letter to UN chief.  

According to the International Committee of the Red Cross, cluster munitions kill and injure large numbers of civilians and cause long-lasting socio-economic problems. The 2008 Convention on Cluster Munitions prohibits the use, production, stockpiling and transfer of cluster munitions and requires States to ensure that they claim no further victims.

The ISPR said this blatant Indian aggression against all international norms exposes true character of Indian Army and their moral standing.

It added that it was time for the international community to take notice of “this Indian blatant violation of international laws” on use of cluster ammunition for the purpose of targeting innocent citizens.

The ISPR also shared images of civilians who sustained gruesome injuries from the Indian troops’ use of cluster munitions.

The ISPR statement comes a day after the Azad Jammu and Kashmir government warned people, particularly those living along the LoC, against touching or picking any familiar and unfamiliar devices or gadgets if found lying anywhere in the shelling-infested areas to avoid any danger to their lives.

Three people lost their lives and four others were wounded when they tried to tamper with a dud device in a shop near Muzaffarabad a few days ago.

Pakistan has completed 90 per cent work on the Kartarpur Corridor, from the zero line to the Gurdwara Nankana Sahib, ahead of its inauguration on the 550th birth celebrations of Guru Nanak in November.

According to reports in Pakistani media, the work includes construction of main road, bridge and buildings from zero line to Gurdwara Sahib.

The first batch of pilgrims will start from India for Kartarpur Sahib on Nov.9.

The corridor is expected to be inaugurated on the occasion of Guru Nanak’s anniversary in November by Prime Minister Imran Khan and Chief of the Pakistan Army Staff General Qamar Javed Bajwa.

India and Pakistan have reiterated their commitment to constructing the passage despite tensions since the Pulwama terror attack. This will also be the first visa-free corridor between the two nuclear-armed neighbours.

In an unrelated development, a Karachi court has issued notices to the Pakistan International Airlines (PIA), its chief executive officer and the Civil Aviation Authority for recovery of Rs14 million in a damages suit filed by a family whose grandmother died in an accident at an Iraqi airport due to alleged negligence of the defendants.