IAF Pilots Booked in Pakistan For Destroying Trees in Balakot Air Strike: Report
Unidentified IAF pilots hastily dropped their payload causing damage to 19 trees, says the FIR.
New Delhi/Islamabad, March 8: Days after the Indian Air Force (IAF) conducted an air strike against the Jaish-e-Mohammed’s largest training camp in Pakistan, Islamabad on Friday registered an FIR against unidentified IAF pilots destroying 19 trees in the Balakot area, according to a media report. The FIR was lodged by the forestry department. Pakistan also plans to lodge a complaint against India at the United Nations for 'eco terrorism', the report said.
Unidentified IAF pilots hastily dropped their payload causing damage to 19 trees, says the FIR, the Express News reported. Earlier, Pakistan’s Climate Change Minister Malik Amin Aslam had said Indian jets bombed a forest reserve and the government was undertaking an environmental impact assessment, which will be the basis of a complaint at the United Nations and other forums. US Tells Pakistan to Take 'Sustained and Irreversible' Actions Against Terrorists.
"What happened over there is environmental terrorism. There has been serious environmental damage," Aslam had said, adding that dozens of pine trees had been felled in the IAF bombing. The UN states that “destruction of the environment, not justified by military necessity and carried out wantonly, is clearly contrary to existing international law”, the report quoted the UN General Assembly resolution 47/37 as saying. India, Pakistan Should Turn the Page, Covert Crisis into Opportunity: China.
On February 26, India said IAF jets, in the face of imminent danger, launched a preemptive strike on Balakot in Pakistan’s Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province. "In an intelligence-led operation in the early hours of today, India struck the biggest training camp of JeM in Balakot. In this operation, a very large number of JeM terrorists, trainers, senior commanders and groups of jihadis who were being trained for fidayeen action were eliminated," Foreign Secretary Vijay Gokhale said in a statement.
Pakistan has been claiming that some parts of a forest area suffered damage in the bombing.
(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Mar 08, 2019 05:48 PM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).