India announced that it fired missiles into several areas of Pakistan-controlled territory on May 7, including the divided Kashmir region.
“A little while ago, the Indian armed forces launched ‘OPERATION SINDOOR’, hitting terrorist infrastructure in Pakistan and Pakistan-occupied Jammu and Kashmir from where terrorist attacks against India have been planned and directed,” the statement said.
“Our actions have been focused, measured and non-escalatory in nature,” it added. “No Pakistani military facilities have been targeted. India has demonstrated considerable restraint in selection of targets and method of execution.”
Pakistani officials said that at least three people have died, including one child, and 12 were injured. One of the places reportedly struck was a mosque in the city of Bahawalpur in Punjab.
Pakistan’s Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif convened a national security committee meeting, and called India’s air strike an act of war.
“Pakistan has every right to give a robust response to this act of war imposed by India, and a strong response is indeed being given,” he said in a statement.
“The Pakistani nation and the Pakistan Armed Forces know very well how to deal with the enemy,” he said. “We will never let the enemy succeed in its nefarious objectives.”
Shortly after that statement, the Indian army released a statement saying that Pakistan fired artillery into India-controlled Kashmir, stating that Indian forces were “responding appropriately in a calibrated manner.”
Police later reported that a woman on the Indian side was killed as Indian and Pakistani forces exchanged mortar fire along the border.
India’s embassy in the United States announced that Secretary of State Marco Rubio has been briefed on the situation.
In a statement, the embassy said that India’s actions “were measured, responsible and designed to be non-escalatory in nature. No Pakistani civilian, economic or military targets have been hit. Only known terror camps were targeted.”
This action came amid heightened tensions between the two nuclear-armed countries after 26 male tourists were killed in a terrorist attack in the Indian-controlled portion of Kashmir in April. India has blamed Pakistan for backing the attack, which Pakistani authorities have denied, and vowed to respond.
According to Reuters, Pakistan said that it had intelligence saying India was planning to attack.
Rubio called Sharif and India’s foreign minister, Subrahmanyam Jaishankar, on April 30 to urge the two nations to de-escalate tensions in Kashmir.
“He also encouraged India to work with Pakistan to de-escalate tensions and maintain peace and security in South Asia.”
After the strike, the Indian army said in a post on X, “Justice is served.”
The escalating conflict has also drawn the attention of the United Nations Secretary General Antonio Guterres, who, according U.N. spokesperson Stephane Dujarric, is calling for restraint.
“The world cannot afford a military confrontation between India and Pakistan,” the statement read.
