 "As India hits Pakistan's air defence, Shehbaz Sharif holds emergency meeting")
After Pakistan escalated the tensions with India last night with attempted drone and missile attacks, Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif is holding an emergency meeting with top civilian and military leaders of the country, according to Geo News.
Shehbaz chairs the National Security Council (NSC) of Pakistan. The NSC on Wednesday had authorised the military to strike India with the force it deems fit at the time and place of its choice.
**Follow our complete coverage of India-Pakistan tensions here**With their remarks, Pakistani leaders had been setting the stage for an escalation since early Wednesday. Shortly after Defence Minister Khawaja Asif dubbed Indian strikes under Operation Sindoor as “declaration of war”, Shehbaz in an address to the nation vowed to avenge “every drop of blood” spilt in the conflict so far.
Hours after the NSC’s authorisation, Pakistan mounted attacks across northern and western India with missiles and drones but those attacks were intercepted and neutralised, said India in a statement earlier in the day.
India said that Pakistan attempted to hit the following locations: Awantipura, Srinagar, Jammu, Pathankot, Amritsar, Kapurthala, Jalandhar, Ludhiana, Adampur, Bhatinda, Chandigarh, Nal, Phalodi, Uttarlai, and Bhuj.
In response to Pakistan’s attempted attacks, India struck air defence radars and systems at a number of locations in Pakistan , according to the statement.
India further said that it has been reliably learnt that an air defence system at Lahore was neutralised in strikes.
Impact Shorts
More ShortsOn its part, Pakistan said that it downed 24 Indian drones attempting strikes in Pakistan.
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