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Operation Vijay to continue till infiltrators are driven out

Tara Shankar Sahay in New Delhi

The government has seen reports that the Pakistani intruders will be withdrawing from the Indian side of the Line of Control within 72 hours, but Operation Vijay will continue till all the intruders have been driven out, the external affairs ministry spokesman said today.

Joint Secretary Raminder Singh Jassal made this assertion during the joint briefing of the external affairs and defence ministries on the Kargil conflict.

A reporter had asked Jassal if it was true that the intruders would be withdrawing soon as reported in Pakistani newspapers.

The army spokesman, Colonel Bikram Singh, said 99 per cent of the areas in the Batalik sector have been cleared and enemy resistance in the sector has crumbled in the face of consistent Indian artillery fire.

Colonel Singh said the enemy's supplies in the Batalik sector had been effectively strangled. As a result, the intruders were faced with scarcity of food, water and other essentials. That coupled with spectacular military operations by the Indians had enabled the troops to recapture four ridges in the sector, he said.

The Indians had killed 103 Pakistani soldiers in the operations in the Batalik sector, he said. They also found shallow pits containing another 83 bodies.

Colonel Singh said 90 per cent of the Drass sector has also been cleared. But the rest are still resisting and fighting there is bound to be bloody, he said.

Referring to the Drass sector, he said the Naga Regiment had in a daring assault killed four enemy soldiers. The bodies of 22 other enemy soldiers had been recovered from Pimple II, he said, along with a large quantity of arms, including heavy mortars, Universal machine-guns and Kalashnikov rifles, and three tons of ammunition.

The Indian Air Force spokesman, Group Captain D N Ganesh, said there were no air strikes yesterday because the ground situation did not warrant them. But early this morning, Mirage 2000 jets attacked the enemy concentration at Pimple II accurately and effectively. During the attack, two vehicles were spotted in the target area and at least 50-60 personnel running helter-skelter in confusion.

The Kargil Crisis

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