Indian soldier martyred on the LoC cremated with state honours
"India is not a threat to Pakistan, but terrorists nurtured by Pakistan are to the entire region," said India on Wednesday in a strongly worded resolution in Parliament condemning Pakistan, a day after a similar resolution in Islamabad criticized "unprovoked aggression" by India along the Line of Control (LOC).
"There should be absolutely no doubt in anyone's mind, including members of the Pakistan National Assembly, that it was the Pakistan Army that was involved in unprovoked attack on an Indian Army patrol on our side of the LOC on August 6," said the resolution, referring to the killing of five Indian soldiers in a Pakistani ambush in Poonch, Jammu.
Rejecting Pakistan's allegations as "absolutely baseless and unfounded", India also hit back at Islamabad's mention of Kashmir: "... the entire state of Jammu & Kashmir including the territory forcibly and illegally occupied by Pakistan is integral part of India, and will always remain so."
(Read: India's tough message on Kashmir)
On Tuesday, Pakistan's lower house had passed an almost identical resolution accusing India of "unprovoked aggression". It had also extended support to the "struggle of the Kashmiri people".
Within hours, Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif pledged to react with "restraint and responsibility" to the escalating tensions at the LOC at a joint news conference with UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon.
"We have to defuse tension and de-escalate the situation. Our objective is peace. For that what we need is more diplomacy," he said.
Ties between the neighbours took a sharp down turn after the killing of Indian soldiers at the LOC, which cast a shadow on possible talks between the Indian and Pakistani Prime Ministers on the sidelines of a UN meet in New York next month.
Since the killings, there have been a series of ceasefire violations by Pakistan, reinforcing an assessment among top Defence sources in India that Pakistan may step up attacks at the border with general elections in India just months away.
Also, the sources say, Pakistan's Army Chief General Ashfaq Kayani is expected to retire in November and seems to be flexing muscle to send a message to the civilian government in Pakistan.