Surrender or be killed

India warns mothers to tell their militant sons to give up following suicide killings

INDIA’S top military commander in Kashmir yesterday told mothers to get their militant sons to surrender or see them dead, as security forces intensified a crackdown in the disputed region after a suicide bomber killed 40 paramilitary police.

The Pakistan-based Jaish-e-Mohammad (JeM) militant group claimed responsibility for Thursday’s attack on a security convoy, but the Pakistani government has denied any link to the blast, which has ramped up tension between the nuclear-armed rivals.

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, facing a general election by May, has come under domestic pressure to exact revenge.

Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan denied that his country had anything to do with the bombing. He said Pakistan was ready to talk with India on terrorism but would retaliate if attacked.

The Indian commander in its part of divided Kashmir, Lieutenant-General KJS Dhillon, accused Pakistan’s main Inter-Services Intelligence spy agency of “controlling” the deadliest attack on security forces in three decades of insurgency in the Muslim-majority region.

“I would request all the mothers in Kashmir to please request their sons who have joined terrorism to surrender and get back to the mainstream,” Dhillon said. “Otherwise anyone who has picked up the gun will be killed.”

The bomb attack was carried out by a 20-year-old man whose parents said had joined a militant group after being beaten by Indian troops three years ago.

India has long blamed Pakistan for the nearly 30-year revolt in Jammu and Kashmir, its only Muslim-majority state.

Indian forces on Monday killed three militants, including the suspected organiser of the bombing, in a 17-hour military operation in which five troops and a civilian were also killed.

Dhillon said one of the militants killed on Monday was from Indian Kashmir while the other two were from Pakistan.

“It was being controlled from across by ISI and Pakistan and JeM commanders,” Dhillon said.

Dhillon did not provide any proof for his accusation and said he could not be more specific about the investigation into the blast and the suspected role of the Pakistan military intelligence agency, except to note its close links with the JeM.

Jammu and Kashmir, a former princely state on the border between India and Pakistan, has been in dispute since the partition of India in 1947. Control is split between the two countries but each claims the region in full.

The neighbours have fought three wars since 1947, two of them over Kashmir.

The bomb attack has sparked outrage in India with calls for revenge circulating on social media.