Turbulence in Afghanistan-Pakistan to have impact on J&K: Army

"India, Kashmir and Pakistan are all at the peripheries of the problem area of Afghanistan. So if peace does not exist in Afghanistan and there is turbulence in Pakistan, obviously there will be turbulence around us," General Officer Commanding, 15 Corps, Lt General S A Hasnain told reporters here, 30 kms from capital Srinagar.

Lt Gen Hasnain was replying to a question about the impact on Kashmir after the US forces withdraw from Afghanistan.

"The problem is always that of turbulence. An area that is turbulent will always send waves of turbulence into the other areas," the GOC said.

He said the Army has reports that militants across the Line of Control (LoC) will attempt to infiltrate into the state in the next few days.

"Snow is melting fast and we have recieved reports that there is concentration (of militants) at the training camps and lauching pads (on the other side) again," Lt Gen Hasnain said.

He, however, said the counter-infiltration grid of the Army is strong and any attempt by the militants to cross into the region will be foiled.

"I want to assure you that counter-infiltration grid is strong and we have sophisticated survaillance devices.. I am hopeful that there will be no infiltration," he said.

"Our assessment is that there were about 600-700 militants at all the lauchpads (on the other side of LoC) across the Kashmir, they even attempted to infiltrate but they were not successful," he added.

Lt Gen Hasnain said "state of militancy" is not based on the number of militants present in an area.

"Until they have the capacity to infiltrate and there is the intent, militancy is present here," he said.