Pak’s Siachen bids on eve of talks foiled

“In the fourth and fifth attempts since October 18 to capture dominating posts on the Siachen Glacier, an alert paratrooper of the Army, Kuber Chand, opened fire on a Pakistani assault party which crossed the actual ground position line (AGPL) at 7.45 pm on Sunday in the area south of the Chulung pass,” said Brig (General Staff) A K Chopra of the 15 Corps.

Chand alerted the Indian post and the fire from the medium machine guns, light machine guns and SLRs repulsed the attack in which twoPakistani soldiers were killed. The Pakistani troops also fired on the Indian post before retreating.

“At 4.45 am Monday, two parties of the Pakistani Army moved 1 km from their post and crossed the AGPL to head towards the Indian post 6 km west of NJ 9842,” said Brig Chopra.

“The Indian sentry, Sepoy Raj Kumar, saw seven to eight soldiers when they were 400-500 m away. He alerted the post and machine gun fire repulsed the Pakistanis,” the defence spokesperson said.

Seven Pakistani soldiers of the other party then opened fire from another direction but the Indian post was able to counter it. However, Sepoy Raj Kumar was injured in the fire while the casualties on the Pakistani side could not be determined.

Eight Pakistani soldiers have been killed while at least another eight have been injured in the attempts to capture posts on the Siachen Glacier over the last 15 days. There have been seven attempts this year in all, with four on the Northern Glacier and three on the Southern Glacier. Pakistanitroops have fired an estimated 1,50,000 rounds of the small arms along with 30,000 shells of the artillery/mortar on to Indian positions on the Siachen Glacier since January 1, 1998. The Indian posts afford a commanding view of the Pakistani movement and allow troops to bring down accurate artillery fire whenever the Pakistani guns target Indian helicopter supply missions.

Army officers said that with the forthcoming talks on Siachen from November 5, the Pakistanis were attempting to gain an Indian post on the commanding heights and so get into a bargaining position before the talks. At worst the escalation of conflict would pre-empt any outcome of the talks even remotely unfavourable to Pakistan.