India accuses Pakistan of utilizing as much as 400 drones to assault cities and bases

[ad_1] India has accused Pakistan of launching an assault utilizing as much as 400 drones to focus on cities, army bases and locations of worship throughout the north of the nation on Thursday evening, because the Pakistani army stated it will “not de-escalate with India”.

India claimed to have intercepted tons of of Pakistani drones, which it stated got here throughout the border into Indian-controlled Kashmir , in addition to Rajasthan, Punjab and Gujarat. It stated a primary wave of drones got here on Thursday night and one other wave hit near daybreak on Friday.

India stated it had launched 4 drone strikes at Pakistan, instantly concentrating on army defence infrastructure.

In a press convention on Friday, the Indian army alleged that Pakistan’s drone assaults on Thursday had focused a gurdwara, a Sikh place of worship, injuring a civilian, and that the drones had additionally focused Christian church buildings.

“The concentrating on of temples, gurdwaras, convents is a brand new low by Pakistan,” stated India’s overseas secretary, Vikram Misri.

Pakistan’s info minister, Attaullah Tarar, denied the drone assaults, calling the Indian military assertion “baseless and deceptive”, and stated Pakistan had not undertaken any “offensive actions” inside Indian-controlled Kashmir or past Pakistan’s border.

Nonetheless, a Pakistan safety official advised the Guardian that Thursday evening’s drone strikes have been simply to “warmth issues up” earlier than Pakistan launched a totally fledged retaliatory assault. “Once we hit again, everybody will know,” they stated.

Misri known as Pakistan’s denial of the drone assaults “farcical” and “one other instance of its duplicity”.

<gu-island name="InteractiveBlockComponent" priority="critical" deferuntil="idle" props="{"url":"https://interactive.guim.co.uk/uploader/embed/2025/05/kashmir-zip/giv-32554anHbr9JRQPkS","scriptUrl":"https://interactive.guim.co.uk/embed/iframe-wrapper/0.1/boot.js","alt":"Map of Kashmir","format":{"design":0,"display":0,"theme":0},"elementId":"d5b7ccb6-5f4b-468b-92eb-edc8bcf53bd4","isMainMedia":false}"> Map of Kashmir The tit-for tat allegations have been yet one more alarming confrontation between India and Pakistan, two nuclear-armed nations, since India’s missile strikes on nine sites in Pakistan on Wednesday killed 31 individuals. Pakistan stated it thought-about the assault an “act of warfare” and vowed to retaliate.

“We is not going to de-escalate – with the damages India did on our facet, they need to take a success,” Pakistan’s army spokesperson, Ahmed Sharif Chaudhry, stated at a media briefing. “Thus far we now have been defending ourselves however they are going to get a solution in our personal timing.”

The Pakistani military gave new particulars of Wednesday’s strike during which it claimed Pakistan had deployed greater than 100 planes to keep at bay the strikes by Indian planes that carried out the assaults from Indian airspace. It stated the 2 sides had engaged in an hour-long aerial dogfight.

A person removes particles after his home was destroyed by Pakistani shelling in Lagama village in Uri, Indian-administered Kashmir. {Photograph}: Basit Zargar/Zuma Press Wire/Shutterstock Pakistan claimed it used Chinese language-made weapons and floor air defences to assist carry down 5 Indian fighter jets. India has but to answer allegations that Pakistan shot down its planes, however particles from a minimum of three fighter jets, together with that of a minimum of one elite French Rafale jet, was seen in Indian-controlled Kashmir and Punjab.

The worst-affected space from Thursday’s drone assaults was town of Jammu, in India-administered Kashmir, which is near the road of management (LoC), the closely militarised border dividing the disputed area of Kashmir between India and Pakistan.

Regardless of many years of battle within the area, individuals within the metropolis stated they'd by no means witnessed such an aerial onslaught. They described a barrage of fiery projectiles streaking throughout the sky as air-raid sirens wailed and town was plunged into an enforced blackout in a single day.

Movies shared with the Guardian confirmed glowing orange dots piercing Jammu’s evening sky earlier than flashing and fading – most likely drones intercepted by Indian air defence techniques. Native officers confirmed particles from the projectiles had been recovered from a number of areas, together with densely populated neighbourhoods in and round Jammu, however no casualties have been reported.

Ajay Lakhotra, a 24-year-old scholar in Kanachak, a suburban space near the Pakistan border, stated: “Skirmishes and exchanges of gunfire are nothing new to us, however what occurred on Thursday evening was extraordinary. We noticed fiery objects launching from the Pakistani facet; the barrage was so intense it appeared like fireworks lighting up the sky. Flames streaked in every single place. It was terrifying to witness.”

He stated it had quietened down after midnight however restarted at 4am. “Most of us couldn’t sleep all evening.”

Deadly aggression continued alongside the LoC as troopers from each side continued to fireplace throughout the border, killing and injuring civilians. With Pakistan’s threats to retaliate nonetheless looming, Indian-administered Kashmir and states throughout northern India remained on excessive alert.

The mounting aggressions and allegations have resulted in a rising info – and disinformation – warfare on each side of the border.

India accused Pakistan of a flood of harmful disinformation and “grossly exaggerated claims” throughout its media, together with studies that dozens of Indian drones had been shot down over Pakistan, calling it a “gross misrepresentation of info”.

“What ought to have been a second of worldwide reckoning towards terror has as a substitute been manipulated right into a disinformation warfare, the place fact is the primary casualty,” India’s ministry of knowledge and broadcasting stated in a press release.

A safety officer stands guard close to Karachi Port in Pakistan on Friday. {Photograph}: Rizwan Tabassum/AFP/Getty Pictures Nonetheless, mainstream Indian media has additionally been flooded with misinformation and faux or unsubstantiated studies, together with false claims of an assault on Karachi Port, studies of a army coup and the arrest of Pakistan’s military chief. Pictures of Turkish army personnel have been broadcast as “captured Pakistani pilots”. Pictures of highly effective bomb strikes on Gaza have been extensively shared as exhibiting India’s assault on Pakistan.

As a part of its alleged crackdown on misinformation, India ordered the social media platform X to dam greater than 8,000 accounts, together with these of Pakistani politicians, celebrities and media organisations, in addition to Indian impartial information organisations and Indian-Kashmiri journalists.

The transfer was confirmed by X in a press release, which stated in lots of instances the Indian authorities had not supplied authorized justification for the blocks.

Nonetheless, X stated it had no alternative however to conform and take away the 8,000 accounts or it will face “penalties together with important fines and imprisonment of the corporate’s native workers”.