New Year begins with rise in India-Pakistan tension
On 2 January, India’s Border Security Force (BSF) said that it had prevented yet another infiltration attempt by Pakistan-based militants into Kashmir. This followed on from the sinking of a Pakistani fishing boat, thought to be carrying explosives, on New Year’s eve and was followed by an incident in which a 13-year-old Pakistani girl was killed in cross-border shelling. Pakistan’s Defence Minister Khawaja Asif said the girl had been killed as a result of “unprovoked firing by Indian forces” along the Silakot Working Boundary.
Pakistan appears to be laying the blame for the increased tension on India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Speaking to reporters outside Parliament House, Asif accused Modi of harbouring and “extremist attitude” and of having “a lot of Muslim blood” on his hands. He added: “Even now innocent Muslim lives are being lost”.
The sinking of the Pakistani fishing boat on New Year’s eve by the Indian coastguard led to the loss of four lives. There is some dispute as to whether the boat posed a significant threat (the November 2008 attack on Mumbai in which 160 people were killed was sea-launched) or was just a case of smuggling, but there can be no doubting the fact that India and Pakistan have begun 2015 in a state of high tension. India’s Home Minister Rajnath Singh was reported as having said that the BSF would give Pakistan “a suitable response”. Asif, on the other hand, said after the 13-year-old girl had been killed by Indian shelling that “India would have to be taught in their own language”.
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