The Army is conducting a significant operation with special forces, regular soldiers, helicopters, and drones to find the five to seven terrorists who assaulted an Army truck in Poonch district of J&K in a well-planned ambush, killing five Rashtriya Rifles men and critically wounding a sixth.
The Army vehicle was being transported from Bhimber Gali to Sangiot when the terrorists forced it to halt by laying wood logs on the road. This was done just a few kilometres from the Line of Control. The militants then attacked the Army truck using assault rifles and grenades made in China.
There were prior intelligence reports that Pakistan backed terrorists would conduct attacks with grenades or IEDs (improvised explosive devices) in the run-up to a G20 event in Srinagar next month.
“But the intelligence inputs were general in nature. It’s too early to conclusively say whether the terrorists were from Jaish-e-Muhammed or Lashkar-e-Taiba,” an officer said. The terror attack, incidentally, took place on the day Pakistan announced that foreign minister Bilawal Bhutto Zardari would attend the SCO foreign ministers’ meeting in Goa on May 4-5.
The Army, in conjunction with the special operations group of J&K police and the CRPF, was conducting the major manhunt. “Multiple teams, backed by drones, surveillance helicopters and sniffer dogs, are conducting combing operations in the thickly forested region,” an officer said.
“The terrorists must have conducted prior recce operations before undertaking the ambush. The truck was fired upon from three sides, with the terrorists taking advantage of the low visibility and bad weather in the area,” he added.
Since the repeal of Article 370 and division of the state into two Union territories in August 2019, J&K has seen 32 Army and paramilitary fatalities in terrorist strikes.