28 February 2019•Update: 28 February 2019
By Shuriah Niazi
New Delhi
Indian navy, army and air force said Thursday they will continue targeting terror camps inside Pakistan.
"Our fight is against terrorism. We are ready to destroy terror installations until Pakistan stops backing terrorism,” said Maj. Gen. Surendra Singh Behal while addressing a joint news conference of the armed forces in New Delhi.
On Wednesday, the two countries locked down in their first aerial dogfight in decades along the disputed border with Kashmir, with Pakistan claiming to have downed two Indian aircraft entering their airspace. India said it had shot down a Pakistani aircraft and lost a jet in the process.
Pakistan also captured an Indian pilot who will be released on Friday as a gesture of goodwill, as Islamabad continues to urge for dialogue to defuse escalating tensions.
Air Vice Marshal RGK Kapoor, also present at the briefing, reiterated that they had downed a Pakistani aircraft that had entered Indian airspace.
Refuting claims by the Pakistan army that they had shot targets at an open space, Kapoor said: "There is enough evidence to show that F-16s were used to drop bombs on Indian military installations on Wednesday."
The officials also presented parts of missiles from Pakistani jets found at the site with their electronic signature as evidence.
On Tuesday, Indian jets entered Pakistan claiming to have killed several terrorists inside a training camp of Jaish-e-Mohammad (JEM), a militant group that claimed responsibility of a suicide bombing that killed more than 40 Indian troops earlier this month.
Pakistan, which has banned JEM since 2002 but is accused by India of providing the group a sanctuary, denied the claim saying the Indian jets had dropped bombs at empty forestland.
The U.S., EU, Turkey and many other states have urged both countries to resolve their differences through talks.
The two South Asian nations have fought three wars in 1948, 1965 and 1971 -- two of them over Kashmir -- since they were partitioned in 1947.
