Pakistan’s Prime Minister, Nawaz Sharif, has said he was shocked by the killing of Wani and the civilians.
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While addressing the journalists, they said innocent people were killed in Kashmir by Indian forces.
Curfew today remained in force across Kashmir and normal life paralysed for the eighth day in the wake of clashes following killing of Hizbul Mujahideen commander Burhan Wani that has left 38 persons dead and over 3100 injured.
In New Delhi, India’s External Affairs Ministry spokesman Vikas Swarup asked Pakistan to desist from interfering in India’s internal affairs and destabilizing the situation.
Wani, a 22-year-old poster boy for the region’s biggest rebel group Hizbul Mujahideen, was killed in a gun battle with government forces.
Abdul Rashid Mukhdoomi, printer and publisher of Kashmir valley’s largest circulated daily, Greater Kashmir, said police raided his printing press at 2 a.m. and “took away all the newspapers that were printed and the printing was also stopped”.
Notwithstanding India’s sharp response, Pakistan has demanded a UN-backed independent and transparent inquiry into the “extra-judicial” killings in Kashmir, terming the situation there a “grave threat to peace and security”. Pakistan denies India’s accusations that it arms and trains Kashmiri rebels.
Meanwhile, the Congress spokesperson Manish Tewari condemned Pakistan’s blatant attempt to internationalize the very sensitive situation in Jammu & Kashmir in which it has been an agent provocateur for over two and half decades.
“The self serving actions by Pakistan in the last few days to derive political mileage out of the recent developments in J&K follow planned infiltration and terrorism aimed at India from across the Line of Control and the International Boundary”, Swarup said.
India said Pakistan “extols” the “virtues” of terrorists and uses terrorism as a state policy toward the “misguided end” of coveting the territory of others.
Pakistan has announced to raise the pressing issue of Kashmir at the global level as the death toll following deadly clashes between Indian forces and protesters reached 33.
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Residents of Srinagar and other parts of Valley told media over phone that people were not being allowed to come out of their houses and were also being stopped from going to mosques for offering Juma prayers.
