India accepts it 'accidentally' fired missile into Pakistan

India’s military accidentally fired a missile into Pakistan, New Delhi’s defence ministry said on Friday, calling it “deeply regrettable”.

“In the course of a routine maintenance, a technical malfunction led to the accidental firing of a missile” on Wednesday that landed in “an area of Pakistan”, it said in a statement, adding that a high-level inquiry had been ordered.

It is pertinent to mention here that in a news conference late on Thursday night, Pakistan military spokesman Major-General Babar Iftikhar said, “On 9 March a high-speed flying object was picked up inside Indian territory by air defence operations centre of the Pakistan air force.”

DG ISPR said that he military was not sure of the nature of the object, which he said crashed near Mian Channu and originated from the Indian city of Sirsa, in India’s western Haryana province.

A PAF official at the news conference said the object was being analysed forensically and initial studies suggested it was a surface-to-surface supersonic missile, but was unarmed.

He said it travelled at an altitude of 40,000 feet, at Mach 3, and flew 124 kilometres (77 miles) in Pakistani airspace before crashing.

The foreign office also said in a statement that it summoned on Friday India’s charge d’affaires in Islamabad to lodge a protest over this unprovoked violation of Pakistani airspace.

The foreign office called for an investigation of the incident, which it said could have endangered passenger flights and civilian lives.

Pakistan warned India in the statement “to be mindful of the unpleasant consequences of such negligence and take effective measures to avoid the recurrence off such violations in future.”