Pakistan Tests Missile, India Orders Drills amid Kashmir Standoff
Pakistan carried out a second missile test in three days on Monday and India said it ordered several states to conduct security drills, as fears mounted the neighbors could be heading to a confrontation over a deadly attack in Kashmir.
Moody’s warned that the standoff could set back Islamabad’s economic reforms as world powers called for calm.
Relations between the nuclear-armed states have nosedived since gunmen killed 26 people on April 22 in an attack targeting Hindu tourists in Indian Kashmir, the worst such assault on civilians in India in nearly two decades.
India has accused Pakistan of involvement. Islamabad has denied the allegations but said it has intelligence that New Delhi intends to launch military action against it soon.
The countries have shut their land borders, suspended trade, and closed their airspace to each other’s airlines, and there have been exchanges of small arms fire across the frontier in Kashmir.
India’s interior ministry has asked several states to conduct mock security drills on May 7 to ensure civil preparedness, a government source told Reuters on Monday. They did not say which states or mention Pakistan or Kashmir
