Pakistan has warned that it will “avenge” the death of 31 people killed in overnight missile attacks by the Indian air force, raising fears of an escalating conflict between the two nuclear-armed countries.
In a late night address to the nation late on Wednesday, Pakistan’s prime minister, Shehbaz Sharif, said: “We make this pledge, that we will avenge each drop of the blood of these martyrs.”
His comments came after Pakistan’s government accused India of “igniting an inferno” with strikes on nine sites in Pakistan-administered Kashmir and the Pakistani province of Punjab and authorised its military to take “corresponding” retaliatory action against India.
India said the strikes were a direct retaliation for an attack in Indian-administered Kashmir late last month, in which militants killed 25 Hindu tourists and their guide. India had accused Pakistan of direct involvement in the attacks, through Islamist militant organisations it has long been accused of backing.
In an interview with the Guardian in Islamabad, Pakistan’s deputy prime minister, Ishaq Dar – who is also the foreign minister – said the country would go to “any extent” to defend its dignity. “We reserve the right to authorise the armed forces to take any proper actions in response – and those will be measured, proportionate and responsible,” said Dar.
He refused to be drawn into a timeline on any reprisal attacks but said the plans would be led by the country’s army chief Gen Asim Munir, who would consult with the coalition government. “What measures we can take when and where – I think it’s too premature to be discussed at this stage,” said Dar. “There is no minimum or maximum response time.”
Dar was adamant that until now, Pakistan had exercised “patience and maximum restraint” in the face of India’s accusations and attacks. “Yes, there is a huge economic loss attached to any full-fledged war. But when the question [is] of sovereignty, integrity of the country, territorial integrity, dignity of the nation, then there is no price,” he said.
Dar also expressed his frustration at the international community, which has so far been reluctant to get involved in the latest dispute between India and Pakistan, beyond urging restraint. Calls by Pakistan for assistance in carrying out an independent investigation into the Kashmir attacks had gone unanswered, he said.
Under previous presidents, the US was highly proactive in helping to de-escalate conflicts between India and Pakistan, often averting all-out war. However, Dar noted that the Trump administration had been reluctant to take on the same mediation role. “Yes, in the past US presidents have played an active role. But each administration has its own style of working,” he said.
He added: “It is also the responsibility of the global community because any consequences and negative economic impacts of any such war will not be limited to India-Pakistan. It will cross international boundaries eventually.”
After India’s airstrikes on Wednesday, which killed 31 people, including several children, and injured dozens more, it jubilantly claimed victory over Pakistan.
The Indian army said the strikes had targeted terrorists and terrorist training camps for two Islamist militant groups, Lashkar-e-Taiba and Jaish-e-Mohammed, which have long been accused of freely operating out of Pakistan and have been implicated in some of India’s deadliest terror attacks.
“We killed only those who killed our innocents,” said India’s defence minister, Rajnath Singh, while the home affairs minister, Amit Shah, said the government was “resolved to give a befitting response to any attack on India and its people”.
The Indian army described the missile strikes as “not escalatory, proportionate and responsible”.
Pakistan said that the “unprovoked and unjustified attacks martyred innocent men, women and children”, and denied the existence of any terrorist camps or infrastructure in the areas struck by India. This was reiterated by Dar, who said there were “no terrorist outfits” in the areas struck by India.
For the first time since the India-Pakistan war in 1971, Indian missiles struck inside Punjab, Pakistan’s most politically and militarily important province, killing at least 16 people there.
At a meeting of the national security council on Wednesday, Sharif’s government gave Pakistan’s military authorisation to take action to defend the country’s sovereignty “at a time, place, and manner of its choosing”.
At a session of parliament on Wednesday, Bilawal Bhutto Zardari, co-chair of the Pakistan People’s party, which rules as part of the coalition government, reaffirmed the country’s right to defend itself and said that Pakistan’s answer to India’s attacks “has yet to come”.
“Pakistan has the right to respond to this attack however it wants,” he said.
Kashmir, in the foothills of the Himalayas, has been disputed since the partition of India and the formation of Pakistan in 1947. Both India and Pakistan claim it in full, but each administers a section of the territory, separated by one of the world’s most heavily militarised borders: the “line of control” based on a ceasefire border established after the 1947-48 war. China administers another part in the east.
India and Pakistan have gone to war three times over Kashmir, most recently in 1999.
There were indicators that India had also suffered losses in Wednesday’s attacks, which were carried out by military aircraft and drones from within India’s own airspace. Pakistan claimed that about 80 Indian jets had taken part in the strikes, and said it had “exercised restraint” by shooting down just five.
The Indian government remained tight-lipped about all aircraft reportedly shot down, but debris of at least three planes was reported in areas across Indian-administered Kashmir and India’s Punjab state.
In the Indian-Kashmir village of Wuyan, Adnan Ahmad, 25, reported hearing a loud crash at about 1.40am. “When I rushed to window I saw an aircraft in flames falling down,” he said. “There was another aircraft moving above the falling aircraft. The aircraft landed near a school building, hitting trees. There were multiple explosions from the fallen wreckage for around an hour.”
From the early hours of the morning, there was heavy firing between Indian and Pakistani forces across the line of control. According to officials in Indian-administered Kashmir, at least 12 civilians on the Indian side had been killed since Wednesday morning. Pakistan reported that at least five people had been killed from shelling on their side of the line.
Parvez Khan, the chief medical officer of Poonch, one of the border areas that suffered the worst damage in the cross-border shelling, said 42 people were being treated for injuries.
“Two of my relatives were seriously wounded when a mortar shell hit their home this morning,” said Safeer Abdullah, a Poonch resident who expressed anger over rising India-Pakistan tensions.
“We’ve endured this violence for generations; our ancestors suffered, and now we do too. Every hour here feels like it could be our last. The shelling has been so intense that no one within 150km of the border can sleep or eat properly.”
As the firing continued throughout the day, thousands of residents living near the line of control on the Indian side of the border were forced to evacuate to safer areas. They described living in terror amid what they called a “rain of artillery fire” that damaged homes, a Sikh temple, agricultural fields and vehicles.
Another resident, Abdullah Khan, said he had been confined to a basement with six of his family members since the overnight attack. “Mortar shells have been landing around us since last night. While many have managed to flee to safer areas, we haven’t found an opportunity to escape,” he said.
On Wednesday, the US, UK, China, Iran and UAE all called for a swift de-escalation of the conflict. The British prime minister, Keir Starmer, said the UK was “engaging urgently with both countries … encouraging dialogue, de-escalation and the protection of civilians”.
Donald Trump called for India and Pakistan to halt their fighting, saying: “I want to see them stop. We get along with both countries very well, good relationships with both, and I want to see it stop.”
