AT LEAST nine civilians were killed yesterday when Indian and Pakistani troops bombarded each other with gunfire and mortar shells across the ceasefire line in Kashmir.

Tens of thousands of villagers fled their homes as civilians died on both sides of the border.

Indian officials said that the flare-up left five villagers dead, including one child, and 35 injured on the Indian side of the border. The Pakistani army reported four civilians killed on its side, including two children, and three injured.

The violence followed several meetings between the commanders of the two countries’ border forces aimed at calming tensions.

Each side accused the other of firing first before dawn and each said its troops had only retaliated.

Both sides said the violence was happening at several points along the border, including the designated frontier dividing Pakistan from the Indian state of Jammu and Kashmir, as well as the UN-monitored Line of Control that slices through the mountainous region into an Indian-controlled portion and a Pakistan-administered territory.

A similar outburst of cross-border violence in August led about 15,000 villagers to flee temporarily.

Indian officials regularly accuse Pakistan of waging violence as a cover for separatist militants to infiltrate into India, while Pakistan denies this.

It claims to offer only moral and diplomatic support to the militants and to Kashmiris who oppose Indian rule.

The Indian army said that troops had killed three suspected militants in an early morning gun battle in a forest in Tandhar along the Line of Control.

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