KARACHI: Pakistan’s top generals on Friday blamed last month’s tourist shootings in Indian-administered Kashmir on New Delhi’s “governance failures” and its strategy of using such incidents for political gain, while warning Pakistani security forces were ready to respond to any attack on the country’s sovereignty, according to an official statement.
India blamed Pakistan for the April 22 attack in the scenic town of Pahalgam, in Kashmir’s Anantnag district, where gunmen killed 26 people in one of the deadliest assaults on civilians in nearly two decades.
Pakistan denied involvement, though tensions escalated as India expelled Pakistani diplomats and nationals, closed a key border crossing and suspended the decades-old Indus Waters Treaty (IWT), which has governed the distribution of river waters between the two countries since 1960.
Pakistan’s top general gathered at the General Headquarters (GHQ) in Rawalpindi earlier today to review the geo-strategic environment, with particular focus on the Pakistan-India standoff and the broader regional security situation, the military’s media wing, Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR), said.
“The Forum noted, with serious concern, India’s consistent pattern of exploitation of crises to achieve political and military objectives,” the ISPR said. “They have been following a predictable template — whereby internal governance failures are externalized.”
“These incidents have often coincided with unilateral moves by India to alter the status quo, as seen in 2019 when India similarly exploited the Pulwama incident to unilaterally alter the status quo of Indian Illegally Occupied Jammu & Kashmir, through revocation of Article 370,” it added.
The 2019 Pulwama attack killed 40 Indian paramilitary personnel and was also blamed on Pakistan before New Delhi revoked the region’s special constitutional status to integrate it in the Indian union, a move repeatedly condemned by Islamabad.
The generals expressed concern that India was now using the Pahalgam shootings to undermine the IWT and “usurp Pakistan’s legitimate and inalienable water rights.”
The statement called the move a dangerous attempt to “weaponize water,” threatening the livelihoods of more than 240 million Pakistanis and increasing strategic instability in South Asia.
The commanders also voiced alarm over what they described as credible evidence of Indian military and intelligence involvement in orchestrating militant violence inside Pakistan.
They accused New Delhi of using the Kashmir attack to divert attention from its own domestic challenges and to provide “operational breathing space” to what they called “Indian terror proxies” targeting Pakistan.
While reaffirming Pakistan’s commitment to regional peace and stability, the generals warned that any attempt to impose conflict would be met with a “sure and decisive” response.
Chief of Army Staff General Asim Munir praised the operational readiness and morale of Pakistan’s armed forces and emphasized the need for vigilance and proactive readiness across all fronts.
“Deliberate destabilization efforts by the Indian government will be confronted and defeated with resolve and clarity,” the ISPR said.
Pakistani generals link Kashmir attack to India’s ‘governance failures,’ vow to defend sovereignty
https://arab.news/jzkpw
Pakistani generals link Kashmir attack to India’s ‘governance failures,’ vow to defend sovereignty
- Army says India uses such incidents for political gains like suspending Indus Waters Treaty
- The generals says the Pahalgam attack was to help ‘Indian terror proxies’ targeting Pakistan
Pakistan says over 44.3 million children vaccinated as year’s first anti-polio drive concludes
- Pakistan launched this year’s first week-long anti-polio nationwide campaign on Feb. 2, targeting over 45 million children
- Pakistan’s attempts to eliminate polio have been hindered in past by militant attacks targeting polio workers, security teams
ISLAMABAD: Pakistani health authorities have vaccinated over 44.3 million children during the week-long anti-polio nationwide campaign, the first of this year which concluded last week, the National Emergency Operations Center (NEOC) said on Monday.
Pakistan launched the first anti-polio nationwide campaign on Feb. 2 to target over 45 million children. Over 400,000 trained polio workers took part in the door-to-door campaign to vaccinate children under the age of five against the disease, the government said.
“More than 44.3 million children were administered polio vaccine drops during the campaign,” the NEOC said in a statement.
The anti-polio campaign, which concluded on Sunday, saw over 22.9 million vaccinated in Pakistan’s eastern Punjab province. In Sindh, over 10.5 million children were vaccinated, in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) 7.13 million, in Balochistan 2.36 million, in Islamabad over 455,000, in Gilgit-Baltistan over 261,000 and in Azad Kashmir over 673,000 in seven days, data shared by the NEOC said.
The center said that the campaign was conducted in Pakistan and Afghanistan simultaneously, the only two countries were the disease remains endemic.
Last year, Pakistan reported 31 polio cases, a significant drop from the alarming 74 cases reported in the country in 2024. The South Asian nation reported six cases in 2023 and only one in 2021, but saw a sharp resurgence in 2024.
Pakistan’s polio program began in 1994, but efforts to eradicate the virus have been repeatedly undermined by vaccine misinformation and resistance from some religious hard-liners who claim that immunization is a foreign plot to sterilize Muslim children or a cover for Western espionage.
Militant groups have also frequently targeted polio vaccination teams and the security personnel assigned to protect them, often resulting in deadly attacks, particularly in KP and Balochistan.
“Polio workers and security personnel who performed duties during the campaign are the nation’s true heroes,” the NEOC said.
