India and Pakistan canceled visa services for each others’ nationals on Thursday amid rising tensions over a brutal terrorist attack on Indian tourists in Kashmir.
The uneasy neighbors shut down airspace, closed border crossings, suspended trade, and exchanged increasingly aggressive remarks over India’s suspension of an important water treaty.
On Tuesday, a Kashmir separatist organization called The Resistance Front (TRF) claimed responsibility for the squad of four gunmen who slaughtered 26 and injured dozens more in the Himalayan tourist haven of Pahalgam. The attackers reportedly allowed women and Muslims to flee while they gunned down Hindu men.
Many Indian officials believe the true mastermind behind the attack was a notorious Pakistani terrorist group called Lashkar-e-Taiba (LT). India has long criticized Pakistan for not doing enough to control LT’s cross-border terrorist attacks. Some accuse the Pakistani government of actively supporting the jihadi terrorist group.
Kashmir police on Thursday named three of the four suspects in the attack and posted a reward for information leading to their arrest. The notices identified two of the suspects as Pakistani nationals. The third is a man from Anantnag, a city in the Jammu-Kashmir region. The police said all three are members of Lashkar-e-Taiba.
The Times of India (TOI) reported on Thursday that the Anantag man, Adil Thokar, traveled to Pakistan in 2018 to train at terrorist camps before returning to infiltrate Kashmir last year. TOI’s security sources said Adil kept a “low profile upon his return” while using his extensive knowledge of the Pahalgam area to plan Tuesday’s attack.
“I say to the whole world: India will identify, track, and punish every terrorist and their backer,” Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi told a gathering in the state of Bihar on Thursday.
“We will pursue them to the ends of the Earth,” Modi vowed. “I say this unequivocally: whoever has carried out this attack, and the ones who devised it, will be made to pay beyond their imagination.”
“They will certainly pay. Whatever little land these terrorists have, it’s time to reduce it to dust. The willpower of 1.4 billion Indians will break the backbone of these terrorists,” he said.
Modi rarely speaks to Indian audiences in English, but he did so for part of his speech on Thursday, broadcasting his remarks to an international audience.
India summoned Pakistan’s ambassador on Thursday to declare all defense advisers in the Pakistani diplomatic mission were now persona non grata, and would be expected to leave India immediately. India and Pakistan proceeded to cancel visas for citizens of the opposing country and instructed them to return home.
The Foreign Ministry specified that it urged Pakistanis to leave the country.
“All valid visas issued to Pakistani nationals stand revoked from April 27, while medical visas issued to Pakistani nationals will be valid till April 29,” the Foreign Ministry announced, according to the Hindustan Times. “All Pakistani nationals currently in India must leave India before the expiry of visas, as now amended.”
Pakistan responded to India’s cancellation of visas by closing its airspace to Indian flights, prompting Air India to reroute international traffic.
“Air India regrets the inconvenience caused to our passengers due to this unforeseen airspace closure that is outside our control,” the airline told customers on Thursday.
The government also announced that Indian nationals in Pakistan under the SAARC Visa Exemption Scheme (SVES) had two days to leave the country, with the exception of Sikh religious pilgrims.
Pakistan on Thursday morning said it would “exercise the right to hold all bilateral agreements with India, including but not limited to the Simla Agreement, in abeyance.” The Simla Agreement is a 1972 trade and diplomatic pact that was intended to reconcile the two countries after the Indo-Pakistani War of 1971.
Islamabad framed this dramatic suspension of trade with India as a response to New Delhi suspending the Indus Waters Treaty on Wednesday. Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif’s office said it “vehemently rejects” India’s move, and might be prepared to consider it an “act of war” if India remains in abeyance.
“All trade with India, including to and from any third country through Pakistan, is suspended forthwith,” the prime minister’s office said.
The Indus Waters Treaty is a 1960 agreement brokered by the World Bank that divided the six rivers of the Indus basin between India and Pakistan. The three western rivers went to Pakistan, while the eastern rivers went to India. The treaty permitted India to use the western rivers for “non-consumptive” activity, such as hydroelectric power, but it was barred from altering the flows of the rivers or impeding Pakistan’s access to their waters.
Pakistan’s water table is much more fragile than India’s, so it depends heavily on the supply of water guaranteed by the 1960 treaty. If India significantly alters the flow of the Indus rivers, it could gradually cut off up to 80 percent of Pakistan’s water supply.
The Indus Waters Treaty has no suspension clause, but India has threatened to suspend participation during several previous conflicts with Pakistan, including terrorist attacks and outright shooting wars. Last August, India notified Pakistan that it wanted a comprehensive “review” of the treaty, but Tuesday marked the first time India has formally suspended its participation.
“The Indus Waters Treaty of 1960 will be held in abeyance with immediate effect, until Pakistan credibly and irrevocably abjures its support for cross-border terrorism,” the Indian government said, outraging the Pakistanis, who insist they had nothing to do with the Pahalgam terrorist attack.
