PAK TARGETS
PUNJAB EXPRESS NEWSPAPER 3 2 OCTOBER 2019
ON THE SPOT REPORT
More than 150 people
have been rendered
homeless in heavy
artillery firing from
Pakistan in Gurez
sector along the LoC
By Abhishek Bhalla in Gurez (LoC) NINE-year-old Hilal Ahmed
Chopan begins crying as his
father shows around the
gutted cluster of houses
that has left hundreds
homeless near the Line of
Control in Gurez sector of Jammu
and Kashmir after Pakistan's
aggression using artillery guns tar-geting
civilians.
Hilal like many other kids in the Junglee
village of Kanzalwan area are in shock
after their homes were reduced to ashes
on August 27. Pakistan Army used heavy
artillery to target civilian areas leaving the
residents gripped in fear in Gurez.
Chopan consoles his son every
time the little boy starts sob-bing
haunted by the memory of
the horror. Young Hilal contin-uously
pleads to be taken to a
place of safety. Chopan tells
Hilal that things will be fine,
though he is uncertain himself.
“We elders have seen these
things before but it's impossible
to explain the same to kids. All
the children in the area keep
repeating what happened that
day and are scared,” he said.
Seventeen homes, in which
more than 150 people lived,
were turned into rubble due to
heavy shelling from Pakistan.
The authorities said the viola-tion
of ceasefire from Pakistan
was unprovoked.
Worst shelling by
Pakistan since 2004 Livestock and tourism are the lifeline of economy in
Salam Mohammed Chopan,
an old man with a white beard,
stands at the spot where his
house existed till a few days
back. Pointing to something in
the debris, he says, “These were
utensils in what used to be our
kitchen. It's all ruined now.”
His family included 12 mem-bers,
who lived in two houses
adjacent to each other. Born in
1947, the year India was parti-tioned
and Pakistan was born,
Salam says he has seen it all
over the years.
Recalling what happened on
August 27, he said, “It started
with small arms firing and we
thought it's the usual exchange
of fire between the armies and
will stop. But within minutes
there was artillery shelling leav-ing
people shocked and looking
for shelter.”
Over 150 people ran for cover
and stuffed themselves in a sin-gle
bunker that the locals call a
morcha that was built on their
own. But soon this too was hit
and destroyed.
“It was Allah's will that there
was no loss of life and we had a
miraculous escape,” Salam
added. In the Gurez sector,
such heavy artillery shelling
villages near Gurez sector, where Pakistan has resorted
to heavy shelling.
VERY-BIG
from Pakistan has been used
thrice over the past one month.
Abdul Rashid Ganai, another
resident of the area, has an
additional worry. His son's cer-tificates
and all academic docu-ments
were lost to shelling from
Pakistan. “My son held a degree
in Bachelor of Education. With
his degrees getting burnt,
what will he do now,”
he said.
This is the worst
shelling by Pak-istan
in the north-ern
reaches of
Ter-ror
launch-pads
across the
LoC in the Gurez sec-tor
have 25-30 ter-rorists
Gurez and
Tanghdhar in over
a decade. Sources
said the last time
such heavy artillery
fire was seen was in
2004.
While heavy shelling was
restricted to areas South of Pir
Panjal in places such as
Poonch, Nowshera and Rajouri,
now ceasefire violations are
also being recorded in upper
reaches. The people in these
areas have traditionally sup-ported
the Indian Army.
“By targeting civilians and
disturbing their lives, Pakistan
is trying to create trouble
within locals and the Army,”
said an army official.
Terror launchpads are also
extremely active across the
LoC in the Gurez sector.
Sources say these launch pads
have 25-30 terrorists looking for
any opportunity to infil-trate.
Some of the
launchpads are active
across the LoC in
Macchli, opposite
Davar, where an
Indian Army Brig-ade
HQ is located.
Sonar is opposite
Kanzalwan where
heavy artillery firing
gutted houses. Sou-rces
said more terror
looking for
launchpads are active in
any opportunity
to infiltrate.
Kel, Losar, Taubat and
Drmat across the LoC under
the close watch of the Pakistan
Army, which is trying to push
terrorists to the Indian side.
‘
We elders have
seen these things
before but it's
impossible to explain
the same to kids.
All the children in
the area keep repeat-ing
what happened
‘ — SALAM MOHD CHOPAN,
that day and are
scared.
JUNGLEE VILLAGE RESIDENT
‘
We haven’t been
going to school since
then. For the higher
secondary school we
have to walk 4 to 5
km. Nobody wants to
risk their lives. What if
shelling starts when
were walking to
school.
‘ — MOHAMMED YAKUB,
CLASS 12 STUDENT
THE security agencies
have arrested a Pak-istani
spy from Barmer
in Rajasthan. He had crossed
the border near Barmer with
the help of the Pakistani Army
and was assigned to collect
information on the activities of
the Indian Army and BSF.
According to the reports, the
Pakistani spy, identified as
Kishore, is now being taken to
Jaipur for interrogation. He
was later caught by the vil-lagers
and handed over to the
security forces. On being inter-rogated,
Kishore told the secu-rity
agencies that he was sent
to India by his maternal uncle
to gather information on the
activities of the BSF and the
Indian Army. — Sharat Kumar
PAKISTAN FACES FATF BLACKLIST IN OCT
By Geeta Mohan
in New Delhi
PAKISTAN is in trouble with
the country faring poorly in the
final review of the FATF held
in Bangkok ahead of the ple-nary
to be held in Paris in
October.
The Financial Action Task
Force’s (FATF) Asia-Pacific
Joint Group (APJG) held a
review meeting with Pakistani
officials on issues of anti-money
laundering and com-bating
financing of terrorism
(AML/CFT) regimes.
Sources say Pakistan's evalu-ation
by the APJG, which is a
sub-group of FATF, in
Bangkok this week did not
match up to its projections. Of
the 27-point action plan of the
FATF, Pakistan has cleared
only six. It has failed to show
compliance in 10 and 11 are in-process.
The FATF had given
Pakistan 15-month
deadline to imple-ment
its 27-point
action plan which
ends in September. However,
on most of the areas of compli-ance
that had to be imple-mented
from June 2018 to May
2019, the work is still in
progress.
FATF had placed Pak on its
‘grey list’ in June 2018, giving it
a 15-month Action Plan to
complete implementation of
its 27-point Action Plan,
failing which Pakistan
could be placed in
the blacklist.
In August 2019,
a subsidiary body
of FATF, the Asia Pacific
Group placed Pakistan in the
Enhanced Follow Up List for
failure to meet its standards.
Of the 40 technical compliance
parameters, Pakistan was
‘Non-Compliant’ on 30. And, of
the 11 effectiveness parame-ters,
Pakistan was adjudged as
‘Low’ on 10.
Sources say Pakistan could
face an uphill task in avoiding
blacklisting at the FATF if it
does not show irreversible and
permanent action against ter-ror
financing and financiers.
Watch-dog
had given
Pak 15 months to
implement 27-point
action plan
EXCLUSIVE