India vs Pakistan: A history of conflict
India and Pakistan have fought two wars and countless skirmishes, most of the time over Kashmir.
But rarely have ground troops or air forces crossed the heavily militarised de facto border between the two neighbours, known as the Line of Control (LoC), in Kashmir.
Here are some of the major clashes between the South Asian neighbours:
1947
The first war breaks out over Kashmir after Partition divides the sub-continent into India and Pakistan.
The ruler of Kashmir accedes to India as tribal fighters from Pakistan launch attacks.
(This photo taken in August 1947 shows Indian soldiers walking through the debris of a building in the Chowk Bijli Wala area of Amristar during unrest following the Partition of India and Pakistan.[Source: AFP])
(Photograph:AFP)
1965
India and Pakistan fight a second brief war over Kashmir before a ceasefire is declared.
(A picture dated August 12, 1965 shows Indian soldiers manning a heavy machine gun in the Uri-Poonch operational sector during the Second Indo-Pakistani War, known as the Second Kashmir War, over the disputed regions of Jammu and Kashmir.[Source: AFP])
(Photograph:AFP)
1971
India and Pakistan fight another war, not over Kashmir but over Islamabad's rule in then East Pakistan, with New Delhi supporting Bengali nationalists seeking independence for what would become Bangladesh. India's air force conducts bombing raids inside Pakistan.
(Indian army officers and soldiers stand 11 December 1971 atop a captured Pakistani tank in the desert of the state of Rajasthan during the India-Pakistan border conflict.[Source: AFP]).
(Photograph:AFP)
1984
Indian forces seize the Siachen Glacier, a remote and uninhabited territory high in the Karakoram Range also claimed by Pakistan.
The first of many battles are fought over the high-altitude stretch, until a ceasefire is signed in 2003.
(A forward camp of the Indian army in July 1991 at 16 thousand feet (upper part of glacier) and 45 miles up on a 75 mile Siachen Glacier, in Baltistan province, near the Chinese border. [Source: AFP]).
(Photograph:AFP)
1999
Pakistan-backed militants cross the Line of Control, seizing Indian military posts in the icy heights of the Kargil mountains.
Indian troops push the intruders back, ending the 10-week Kargil conflict which costs 1,000 lives on both sides.
(Soldiers from the Indian army fire their 105mm guns, 31 May 1999, from their outpost near Kargil.[Source: AFP])
(Photograph:AFP)
2019
India vows retaliation after at least 40 soldiers of its paramilitary force CRPF are killed in a suicide attack in Pulwama. New Delhi blames Pakistan-based terror group Jaish-e-Mohammed (JeM) for the attack.
In the early hours of February 26, Indian conducts air strikes against what it calls JeM's "biggest training camp", killing "a very large number" of militants.
(Image source: AFP)
(Photograph:AFP)