Indian cross-border firing kills two in Pakistan: officials

MUZAFFARABAD, Pakistan (AFP) - Two civilians were killed and two others were wounded after Indian troops fired into Pakistani Kashmir Wednesday, in the latest cross-border violence between the nuclear-armed neighbours. 

The incident took place in a village in Abbaspur sector on the Line of Control, the de facto border dividing Kashmir between Pakistan and India. "A brother and a sister were killed and two other women were wounded in firing by Indian troops," local government official Qaiser Aurangzeb told AFP. 

The firing came one day after four people were killed in an hours-long gunbattle with militants attacking a paramilitary camp in Indian Kashmir. All three militants were killed, Indian police told AFP, blaming the Pakistan-based Jaish-e-Mohammed Islamist group for the attack. 

Kashmir has been divided between India and Pakistan since the end of British colonial rule in 1947 but both claim the territory in full. For decades rebel groups have fought Indian soldiers deployed in the territory, demanding independence or a merger of the former Himalayan kingdom with Pakistan. 

The rival armies routinely target each other across the heavily militarised Line of Control that divides the territory, and Aurangzeb said that intermittent "unprovoked firing" by Indian troops in the area was continuing. Another local government official, Tahir Mumtaz, confirmed the firing and casualties.