“The attackers will be killed”, the provincial governor, Atta Mohammad Noor, said on his Facebook page.
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“The area is extensive, and combing will take time”.
The government official, who requested anonymity, said it could take another 48 hours for the base to be secured, and by then the government hoped to have more information about the attackers and what links they may have to Pakistan, if any.
Operations at the air base, where terrorists had launched a pre-dawn attack on Saturday, had continued overnight. UJC leader Syed Sadaqat Hussain said that the attack was carried out by “Kashmiri militants associated with [the] highway squad”.
The security agencies also suspect there were six terrorists divided into two groups – one of four and the other with two members.
Neither anyone in the government nor those involved in the counter-terror operations were still ready to declare a closure to the attack in Pathankot as they declared that the “operations are still going on”. The three attackers in Gurdaspur were killed after a 12-hour standoff with police. “They haven’t been able to do it in the past and won’t ever be able to do it in the future, ” Hussain said.
India accuses Pakistan of arming and training the insurgents, a charge Islamabad denies, and the attack at the base is being viewed as a possible attempt to unravel recent progress in the relationship between the two nations.
The fate of these two terrorists and whether there are more terrorists inside the air base is still not known as security officials were tight-lipped about operational details. The sound of continuing gunfire from the base added confusion to the picture. The second abducted Singh and let him off after taking his SUV which was abandoned about 2 km from the base.
Combing and search operations are going on. Seven troops have been killed.
The Centre on Sunday night said the operation was not over yet, after it had announced that it had ended on Saturday night.
(AP Photo/Channi Anand). Indian security men stop a commuter outside the Pathankot air force base in Pathankot, India, Sunday, Jan. 3, 2016.
Seven soldiers including a lieutenant-colonel in the elite National Security Guards commando unit were killed and 20 were injured in the assault at the base. Suspected militants infiltrated an Indian air force base near the border with P…
Pathankot houses dozens of jet fighters and is located just 50 kilometres (30 miles) from the Pakistan border.
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An element of uncertainty today crept in over next week’s Foreign Secretary-level talks with Pakistan amid indications that these may be deferred in the wake of the Pathankot terror attack last Saturday.
