New Delhi: People’s Anti-Fascist Front (PAFF), an offshoot of Pakistan-backed terrorist outfit Jaish-e-Mohammed (JeM) has released a series of photos on social media which it claimed were from the scene of the Poonch terror attack in which 5 Indian Army soldiers had been martyred.
The terrorist group, which had earlier claimed responsibility for Thursday’s Poonch attack, also announced that it will soon release a video of the incident.
The five martyred Indian Army soldiers, who were part of a Rashtriya Rifles unit, were traveling in a truck that caught fire during Thursday’s Poonch terror attack.
Of the five Indian soldiers who were martyred, Mandeep Singh (Chankoian Kacan village), Harkrishan Singh (Talwandi Barth village), Kulwant Singh (Charik), and Sewak Singh (Bagha) are from Punjab while Debashish Baswal is from Algum Samil Khandayat in Odisha.
Security agencies suspect that around 6 to 7 terrorists were involved in the Poonch attack. The Indian Army had deployed several special forces teams in the Rajouri-Poonch sector of Jammu and Kashmir along with drones and helicopters to hunt down the terrorists.
According to officials, the terrorists who ambushed the Indian Army truck in Poonch used steel core bullets, capable of piercing an armoured shield, and decamped with the soldiers’ weapons amid intensified efforts to trace and neutralise the perpetrators.
They said a sniper is believed to have targeted the truck from the front before the other terrorists sprayed bullets and lobbed grenades on it. Before fleeing, the terrorists stole the soldiers’ arms and ammunition, they added.
Though the area where the Poonch attack took place is considered terrorism-free for long, the Bhata Dhurian forest area remains a notorious infiltration route for terrorists attempting to sneak into India by crossing the Line of Control (LoC) due to its topography, dense forest cover, and natural caves.
In October 2021, nine soldiers were killed in two major gunfights with terrorists within four days in the forest area during a search operation that continued for over three weeks.
The Poonch attack was a grim reminder of a terrorist attack on the official vehicle of a judicial magistrate over two decades ago. District and Sessions Judge V K Phool, a civilian and two police personnel were killed in the attack which took place on December 5, 2001, in the Dehra Ki Gali forests near the Bhata Dhurian forests.
The officials said over 12 people have been detained for questioning in connection with the Poonch attack but no arrests have been made so far.
Security forces are using drones and sniffer dogs to conduct a recce of the dense forest but success has eluded them so far, they said.
It is believed that the terrorists have managed to create safe hideouts in the dense forest to escape the security dragnet or may have crossed over to Pakistan-occupied Kashmir, they added.
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