J&K: Pakistan's BAT attacks Army patrol unit in Poonch; 2 soldiers killed

Srinagar: Two Army soldiers and an ‘intruder’ were killed on Thursday when a Pakistan Border Action Team (BAT) attacked a patrol team along the Line of Control (LoC) in Jammu and Kashmir’s Poonch district.

Army sources in Jammu said that the operation was underway as reports last came in.

“The martyred soldiers were part of an Army patrolling party moving in own area along the LoC when the BAT intruders attacked them,” sources said.

The sources had earlier also said that Indian and Pakistani troops exchanged small, automatics and mortar fire in Poonch district of the de facto border. The sources said that the Pakistani troops once again violated the November 2003 ceasefire agreement by resorting to "unprovoked firing and shelling” Poonch’s Chakan Da Bagh sector.

On May 26, the Army had claimed killing two members of Pakistan’s BAT in Baramulla’s Uri sector of the LoC whereas six militants were gunned down in the same sector a day later.

Parts of the 740-km long LoC had witnessed escalation in tensions following the beheading of two Indian soldiers, also blamed by on Pakistan Army’s BAT on May 1 this year. Subsequent skirmishes had resulted in several civilians being killed and had forced the border dwellers to desert their shell-hit hamlets, mainly in Rajouri district. Islamabad had strongly denied the Indian charges.

Earlier on Thursday, at least, one infiltrating militant was killed in a clash with the Army troops along the de facto border in the State’s Kupwara district.

The incidents came hours after the security forces gunned down three Lashkar-e-Taiba militants in a six-hour long gun battle in Kashmir Valley’s Pulwama district.