The UN Military Observers Group today began a "fact finding mission" to ascertain the Pakistani claim that India last week resorted to "unprovoked firing" on the border in Jammu and Kashmir.
"The UNMOGIP military officers visited the most effected villages today on working boundary near Sialkot due to Indian unprovoked shelling /firing," according to the Pakistan military's media wing, Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR).
The UNMOGIP officers based in Rawalpindi flew by helicopter into the area in Sialkot, some 100 kilometres from Lahore, and visited Saleh Pur, Chaprar and Malane in Chaprar Sector near working boundary, the ISPR statement said.
It said officials of the UN Military Observers Group in India and Pakistan (UNMOGIP) met wounded civilians and witnessed the damage to civilian structures in the area.
Civilians of the area also narrated first hand accounts of the incidents. "The UNMOGIP observers are also offered full access in Pakistan to investigate and bring the facts in front of the world," it said.
UNMOGIP observers have been located at the ceasefire line between India and Pakistan in Jammu and Kashmir since 1949 and supervise the truce between the two neighbours.
India has been maintaining that the UNMOGIP has outlived its utility and was irrelevant after the Simla Agreement and the consequent establishment of the Line of Control (LoC). Following heightened tension along their border resulting in casualties on both sides, India had last week warned Pakistan of an "effective and forceful" response to unprovokedfiring and cross-border terrorism.
India's blunt message followed a series of ceasefire violations along the LoC in Jammu and Kashmir by Pakistan which resorted to mortar shelling of Indian areas over two days. India responded in kind and both sides said they had suffered casualties.
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