A Pakistani official has accused India of killing two Pakistani nationals on its soil, escalating tensions between the two countries.
Pakistani Foreign Secretary Muhammad Syrus Sajjad Qazi claimed that Islamabad has "credible evidence" linking Indian agents to the killings of Muhammad Riaz in Pakistan-administered Kashmir on September 8 last year and Shahid Latif in Sialkot, near Kashmir, a month later.
"These were killings-for-hire cases involving a sophisticated international setup spread over multiple jurisdictions," Qazi told a news conference.
He accused two Indian agents of recruiting assassins to kill the men, both of whom were killed near mosques, but he did not disclose any other information on the victims or explain why New Delhi chose them.
India has long accused Pakistan of harboring terrorists, particularly in Kashmir, a disputed and heavily militarised region that both countries claim entirely.
A de facto border, the Line of Control, separates it from New Delhi and Islamabad. The dispute has resulted in three conflicts between the two countries.
On Thursday, Qazi connected the suspected killings in Pakistan to other reported recent Indian assassination plans in North America.
“They fit the pattern of similar cases which have come to light in other countries including Canada and the United States,” Qazi said. “Clearly the Indian network of extrajudicial and extraterritorial killings has become a global phenomenon.”
India's Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) dismissed Qazi's charges as "Pakistan's latest attempt at peddling false and malicious anti-India propaganda."
"As the world knows, Pakistan has long been a hotbed of terrorism, organised crime, and unlawful international activity. India and many other countries have publicly warned Pakistan that it will be engulfed by its own culture of terrorism and violence," MEA spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal stated.
Last November, the United States accused an Indian government official of conspiring to assassinate an American citizen on Indian soil.
