At the end of April, 25 Indians and one Nepalese national were killed in an attack in a meadow popular with tourists near Pahalgam in Indian-administered Kashmir. The victims, all men, were shot at close range by unidentified gunmen in a popular but isolated travel spot.
Almost immediately after the attack, which India blamed on an obscure group that few had heard of until then called the “Kashmir Resistance,” Narendra Modi’s government pointed the finger at Pakistan, saying it was behind the deadly ambush, though it offered no evidence or credible claims for Islambad’s supposed involvement. While former dictator and President Pervez Musharraf said Pakistan turned a “blind eye” towards the formation of militant groups, officially, Pakistan has long rejected India’s accusations about their role in Kashmiri militancy; recently, the government denied any role in the Pahalgam attacks and offered to cooperate with “any neutral, transparent, and credible investigation,” but Modi and his cronies were having none of this diplomacy nonsense. This trigger-sensitive tension is not new; India has long accused Pakistan of funding and arming militancy in Kashmir. Pakistan has always denied the claims. …..more