During their campaign for local elections in the disputed area, Indian soldiers in India-occupied Kashmir (IoK) killed two suspected fighters along the border with Pakistan, the army announced on Monday.
IoK is preparing for the first local assembly elections in ten years, which will take place on September 18 and feature three phases of voting.
In the Nowshera district, which is covered in forests, the Indian army’s White Knight Corps declared that “two terrorists have been neutralised,” a euphemism they use to indicate the guys had been slain.
According to the army, automatic weapons and military supplies were taken.
There are some 500,000 Indian forces stationed there, engaged in a 35-year conflict that has claimed the lives of tens of thousands of rebels, soldiers, and civilians since 1989.
Since Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s administration abolished the territory’s partial autonomy in 2019 and placed it under New Delhi’s direct supervision, the region has remained without an elected administration.
With a hastily issued presidential order, India had deprived Kashmiris of their unique autonomy that they had enjoyed for seven decades in August 2019. Article 370 of the constitution has been repealed, granting citizens of the rest of India the ability to purchase property in occupied Kashmir and establish permanent residence there.
The action is perceived by Kashmiris and critics of India’s Hindu nationalist-led government as an attempt to introduce more Hindu settlers into the predominantly Muslim region of Kashmir.
The results of the region’s assembly, which will be decided by a total of 8.7 million voters, are anticipated on October 8.
Modi is scheduled to speak at campaign rallies for his Hindu-nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in the heavily Hindu-populated southern Jammu regions of the occupied territory ahead of the election.
Over 50 Indian soldiers have lost their lives in fighting over the last two years, primarily in the occupied Jammu area.
