MUZAFFARABAD: A single gunshot by Indian forces from across the Line of Control (LoC) killed a mother of two in a village in Azad Jammu and Kashmir, a police official said on Saturday.

Munazza Bibi, 22, wife of Wasim Malick, died at 10pm on Friday at her home in Lawana Khetar village, said the Bhimber Senior Superintendent of Police (SSP).

The Inter-Services Public Relations, the media affairs wing of the Pakistan Army, in a press release issued from Rawalpindi confirmed the incident.

The ISPR said Pakistani troops engaged Indian posts that had carried out unprovoked firing.

The village where the incident happened is hardly one kilometre from the heavily-militarised LoC within the jurisdiction of Barnala police station.

The woman was shot by a sniper from an Indian army post when she switched on a torch to search for something in the veranda of the house, the SSP said, adding the bullet pierced her head.

The latest casualty raised the death toll by Indian shelling in AJK in the ongoing year to 27, among them eight women, senior official at the AJK State Disaster Management Authority Saeed Qureshi said, adding that around 146 people were also injured.

Furthermore, cross-LoC firing partially damaged some 29 houses and destroyed another three and a shop in parts of AJK within this year, Mr Qureshi said.

Though India and Pakistan signed a historic truce agreement in 2003, for more than two years the LoC and the Working Boundary have constantly witnessed ceasefire violations.

In May, the directors general military operations (DGMOs) of India and Pakistan agreed to undertake measures for improving the situation and bringing about peace for the populace living along the LoC and the Working Boundary.

They also agreed to implement the 2003 ceasefire understanding in letter and spirit.

Condemning the unrelenting and unprovoked ceasefire violations by the Indian army, the AJK government called upon the international community in general and the United Nations in particular to take stock of the situation to avoid further loss of innocent lives.

“Sniping at innocent and unarmed civilians is an extreme form of beastliness on the part of trigger-happy Indian soldiers,” AJK’s Senior Minister Chaudhry Tariq Farooq said in a statement.

“Such dastardly acts must not go unnoticed in the civilised international community and the UN,” he added, while offering condolences to the bereaved family.

Published in Dawn, November 4th, 2018