Officials said that the Army opened fire after noticing suspicious movement of two groups of infiltrators along the LoC in the Akhnoor sector of the Jammu district and the Sunderbani sector of Rajouri district.

“No firing exchanges took place in these areas. A massive search operation has been started at both places to ensure that no infiltrator manages to sneak into our side of the LoC,” officials said.

High alert is being maintained all along the 740-Km long LoC and the 1216-Km long International Border in J&K following reports of the presence of a group of hardcore foreign mercenaries in the hilly districts of Jammu division.

Army has deployed over 4,000 soldiers drawn from the elite Para commandos and highly trained soldiers in mountain warfare in the Jammu division to combat terrorism. These soldiers have been deployed along with the troops of the CRPF in the hilly districts of Poonch, Rajouri, Doda, Kathua, Reasi and Udhampur districts.

In addition to this, village defence committees (VDCs) of civilians volunteering to fight terrorism are also being equipped with automatic weapons and other logistic and strategic support to shrink the hiding spaces of the terrorists.

The terrorists have carried out hit-and-run attacks on the Army, paramilitary troopers and civilians. These attacks have remained focused around the hilly, rugged mountainous areas of the Jammu division where terrorists disappear into densely forested and foliaged areas near the spot of the attack.

To hunt the terrorists down, massive cordon and search operations are carried out almost on a daily basis in these areas.

Over 50 suspects believed to be harbourers, sympathisers and over-ground workers (OGWs) of the terrorists have been arrested.

At least two of these suspects have confessed to having accompanied the terrorists when they carried out terror attacks.