• The operation involved seizing weapons and other war-like stores.
• Both India and Pakistan claim full control of Kashmir, having fought three wars over the region.
• The conflict has claimed the lives of tens of thousands of civilians, soldiers, and rebels since 1989.

The army in India-administered Jammu and Kashmir has announced that soldiers killed three suspected militants, marking the latest incident in an uptick of attacks in the disputed northern territory. Kashmir, with a Muslim-majority population, has been divided between India and Pakistan since their independence from British rule in 1947.

Late Sunday, the Indian army’s Chinar Corps reported that three individuals were killed in an “anti-infiltration operation” in Kashmir’s Kupwara district, during which they seized “weapons and other war-like stores.” Both India and Pakistan claim full control of Kashmir and have fought three wars over the Himalayan region.

New Delhi and Islamabad accuse each other of stoking militancy and espionage to undermine one another. Since 1989, rebel groups have waged an insurgency demanding independence for the territory or its merger with Pakistan. The conflict has claimed the lives of tens of thousands of civilians, soldiers, and rebels.

Earlier this month, gunmen ambushed an army convoy, killing five soldiers. In separate incidents, two other soldiers and six suspected militants were also killed.

In June, a gunman opened fire on a bus carrying nine Indian Hindu pilgrims from a shrine in the southern Reasi area, killing nine and wounding dozens. This attack was one of the deadliest in years and the first on Hindu pilgrims in Kashmir since 2017 when gunmen killed seven people in another ambush on a bus.

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