SRINAGAR: Thousands of people from the northern Indian state of Jammu and Kashmir headed back to their homes near the de facto border with rival Pakistan on Wednesday, after their armies agreed to stop exchanging artillery fire following repeated recent clashes.
More than 50,000 people had taken shelter in schools and colleges in the Indian-ruled part of disputed Kashmir, away from the shelling that officials say killed 12 people and wounded many more on both sides over the past few weeks.
Mountainous Kashmir is divided between the nuclear-armed neighbours, who both claim it in full and have fought two of their three wars over the region since their separation in 1947. On Tuesday, their armies agreed to "fully implement" a 2003 ceasefire agreement.
"In case of any issue, restraint will be exercised and the matter will be resolved through utilisation of existing mechanisms of hotline contacts and border flag meetings at local commander's level," Pakistan's military said in a statement.
Bacchan Lal, the headman of Abdullian village in Jammu and Kashmir, who has been living in a college with 350 other people over the past two weeks, said such agreements rarely last long.
"They agree to respect the ceasefire several times every year but then they violate it again. Every time people are killed, cattle perish and we end up in such camps," he said. "We are in camps for the second time this year. We don't want this uncertainty. We want permanent peace as we had 30 years ago".
Farmer Chuni Lal, 45, said he was worried about a delay in sowing premium Basmati rice this year because of the hostility. He said tillers like him could not afford to miss the key planting season, urging the countries to find a lasting solution to the regular outbreaks of firing.
Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti, who runs the state with the support of Prime Minister Narendra Modi's Hindu nationalist party, welcomed the ceasefire agreement.
"This brings great relief to the people residing in the vicinity," she said on Twitter on Wednesday. "Peace on our borders is the first essential step to a larger understanding and I truly hope it sustains."
Tensions between the two sides had escalated since an attack on an Indian army camp in February that India blamed on Pakistan. Islamabad regularly denies Indian allegations that it trains and arms militants and helps them infiltrate across the so-called Line of Control that divides Kashmir.
Thousands go home as India, Pakistan agree to end Kashmir firing
Thousands go home as India, Pakistan agree to end Kashmir firing
- Tensions between the two sides had escalated since an attack on an Indian army camp in February that India blamed on Pakistan.
- India and Pakistan agree to respect the ceasefire several times every year but then they violate it again.
Russia working ‘constantly’ to return Kursk residents: official
Some relatives this week posted photos of their missing relatives on Russian social media platform VKontakte
MOSCOW: An official in Russia’s Kursk border region partly occupied by Ukraine told AFP that authorities were working “constantly” to secure the return of Russian civilians caught behind the front lines — after facing rare public criticism.
Ukraine launched a surprise offensive into the Kursk region last August, seizing dozens of towns and villages in a shock setback for Moscow.
Hundreds were unable to evacuate and are now living in Ukrainian-controlled territory — cut off from communication with Russia.
In rare displays of public criticism amid Russia’s crackdown on dissent, some of their relatives have taken to speaking out against the authorities over the lack of information and failure to secure their return.
“Federal agencies and structures, and also the government of the Kursk region, are carrying out constant work in order to achieve concrete results in searching for and returning residents of Kursk region, with whom relatives have lost contact,” Kursk’s acting information minister, Mikhail Shumakov, said in a letter, dated Tuesday, sent to AFP.
He was replying to a request to comment on accusations from a Kursk woman, Lyubov Prilutskaya, who is campaigning to raise attention of the issue through posts on social media and interviews.
Her parents, who lived in a border village captured by Ukraine, have been missing since August.
Some relatives this week posted photos of their missing relatives on Russian social media platform VKontakte, saying around 3,000 civilians remain in Kyiv-controlled areas of the front-line Sudzha district.
They urged “the leadership of the two countries and international organizations to help save the lives of our family members.”
Kursk authorities in their letter acknowledged a list of 517 missing people published by rights ombudswoman Tatiana Moskalkova was “not comprehensive.”
A Ukrainian military spokesman for Kursk said this month that around 2,000 civilians remained in Kyiv-held territory.
Dozens of local residents forced to leave their homes by Ukraine’s offensive held protests in the main city of Kursk on Saturday and Tuesday, complaining about poor conditions for evacuees and demanding direct dialogue with authorities.
Saudi Arabia set to finance bridge construction in eastern Sri Lanka
- Saudi Fund for Development previously financed Kinniya Bridge, Sri Lanka’s longest
- Kingdom has helped finance various projects and granted development loans to the country
COLOMBO: Saudi Arabia is to finance a bridge construction project in Sri Lanka’s eastern district of Trincomalee, the Kingdom’s envoy in Colombo said on Thursday.
Sri Lanka’s Ministry of Finance, Planning and Economic Development and the Saudi Fund for Development have signed a revised agreement for a $10.5 million infrastructure project in the coastal town of Kinniya that will connect it to the Kurinchakerny peninsula.
The ministry announced on Wednesday: “(Some) $10.5 million has been allocated for the construction of Kurinchakerny Bridge, facilitating the transport and business needs of approximately 100,000 residents.”
The funds were repurposed from an earlier project between the Sri Lankan government and the SFD, the Saudi Ambassador to Sri Lanka Khalid bin Hamoud Al-Kahtani said.
The Kingdom previously funded the reconstruction of the Peradeniya-Badulla-Chenkaladi road in Sri Lanka, which connected the country’s eastern, middle and southern provinces. The massive project, which helped improve road safety and mobility in the island nation, was completed in 2021.
“The balance left from the project has been given for the construction of the project on a request made by the Sri Lankan government,” Al-Kahtani told Arab News.
“Through the revised agreement, it is expected to transfer funds that remained in the aforesaid project … and to mobilize the same towards construction of the Kurinchakerny Bridge (in Kinniya). It is envisaged to provide solutions to many transport difficulties.”
Saudi Arabia has helped finance over a dozen projects in Sri Lanka, covering education, water, energy, health and infrastructure. The SFD has also granted at least 15 development loans to the island nation, worth more than $425 million in total.
In Trincomalee, the new bridge will be the second financed by the Kingdom after the Kinniya Bridge. At 396 meters it is the longest bridge in Sri Lanka and was opened in 2009.
A.L. Ashraff, a Kinniya-based journalist, said that the Kinniya Bridge had “triggered the region’s economic and cultural development.”
The Kurinchakerny Bridge, he said, was a “fantastic gift for the thousands of people in Kinniya, which would make their daily life easier.”
5 treated after stabbing in south London, 1 man arrested
- Metropolitan Police said that a man was arrested following the stabbing in Croydon
- Authorities didn’t provide a motive for the stabbing
LONDON: Five people have been treated following a stabbing Thursday morning in south London, according to London’s Ambulance Service.
London’s Metropolitan Police said that a man was arrested following the stabbing in Croydon, which British media reports said happened near an Asda supermarket. Authorities didn’t provide a motive for the stabbing.
The ambulance service said that one person was taken to a major trauma center in London and four other people were hospitalized.
“We sent a number of resources to the scene, including ambulance crews, a paramedic in a fast response car, an incident response officer, members of our Tactical Response Unit and London’s Air Ambulance,” the service said.
The violence came on the same day that a teenager faced sentencing for fatally stabbing three girls at a Taylor Swift-themed summer dance class in the northwestern English town of Southport.
Police in Hungary investigate bomb threats affecting over 240 schools
- The threats, which came in the form of emails, were identical in their text
- Officers were being dispatched to all affected institutions
BUDAPEST: Police in Hungary said Thursday they were investigating bomb threats that were sent to more than 240 schools across the country, resulting in classes being canceled at some schools.
The threats, which came in the form of emails, were identical in their text and likely sent by a single sender, police said in a statement. Officers were being dispatched to all affected institutions. No explosives or explosive devices were found in the buildings inspected so far, police added.
Gergely Gulyás, chief of staff to Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, said that “education in most schools in the country proceeds smoothly,” and that school administrators could decide for themselves whether to send students home.
He said Orbán on Thursday had consulted repeatedly with the interior minister and the minister in charge of Hungary’s secret services.
The emails were sent from numerous email providers “including foreign ones,” Gulyás said. Hungarian secret services were in consultation with their counterparts in neighboring Slovakia, where similar bomb threats were made last year, Gulyás said.
On Wednesday, numerous schools in around a dozen cities in Bulgaria also received bomb threats, according to Bulgarian public broadcaster BNT.
Kyiv claims Russian forces killed six captured Ukrainian troops
- Officials both in Moscow and Kyiv have accused the other’s army of carrying out killings
- “In the video, the occupiers recorded their own crime,” Ukrainian human rights ombudsman Dmytro Lubinets wrote in a social media post
KYIV: Kyiv accused Russian forces on Thursday of killing six captured Ukrainian servicemen and said it was notifying international rights groups of the latest alleged Russian war crime.
Officials both in Moscow and Kyiv have accused the other’s army of carrying out killings of captured soldiers in violation of international law.
The Ukrainian human rights ombudsman Dmytro Lubinets made the allegations referring to footage circulating on social media that appears to show Russian troops shooting unarmed Ukrainian troops to death.
“In the video, the occupiers recorded their own crime — shooting six Ukrainian soldiers who were captured in the back,” he wrote in a social media post.
The video, which has spread across social media, could not be verified by AFP and there was no immediate comment from Moscow on the claims.
It appears to show Russian soldiers in a muddied frontline area ordering the Ukrainian troops to a clearing where they are then shot in the back one by one.
“I am once again sending information about this crime to the UN and the ICRC (International Committee of the Red Cross). These facts must be recorded,” Lubinets added.
