India-Pakistan relations rapidly deteriorating - World Socialist Web Site
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India-Pakistan relations rapidly deteriorating
By Deepal Jayasekera
1 September 2014
Relations between India and its historic rival Pakistan have deteriorated sharply in recent weeks, especially after India’s government, now led by the Hindu supremacist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), cancelled a much anticipated meeting between the countries’ Foreign Secretaries.
Last month saw a dramatic rise in cross-border firing along the Line of Control (LoC) that separates the Indian- and Pakistani-held sections of the former princely state of Jammu and Kashmir. The cross-border shelling has resulted in at least a half-dozen deaths and terrorized villagers on both sides of the LoC.
By the beginning of last week, Indian government and military officials were issuing a barrage of threats against Pakistan. On a trip to Kashmir, Amit Shah, the BJP President and a close confidant of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, pledged that India would give Pakistan a “befitting reply” if all cross-border firing did not cease.