India Accuses Foe of Torturing Captives

Prospects for peace between India and Pakistan dimmed Friday as Indian leaders charged that six of their soldiers were mutilated and tortured to death while in Pakistani custody.

Outrage among Indians crested on the eve of today’s peace talks between the two countries, which have been engaged in heavy fighting along their disputed border in the Kashmir region since last month. The fighting has raised fears of a wider war between the two states, which tested nuclear weapons last year.

Indian Foreign Minister Jaswant Singh denounced the treatment of the Indian soldiers, whose bodies were handed over Thursday by Pakistani forces. Indian officials said the men, captured during a skirmish with Pakistani troops, had their eyes gouged out, and their ears, noses and genitals cut off. The bodies also bore cigarette burns, officials said.

“The entire nation is outraged by the savage treatment of our soldiers,” said Singh, a former army captain. “It is a reversion to barbaric medievalism.”

A Pakistani officer denied the Indian allegation, dismissing it as a “crude attempt to malign Pakistan.”

The angry exchange punctured any expectation that today’s talks between Singh and Pakistani Foreign Minister Sartaj Aziz will end the fighting.

The incident illustrated how intensely the enemies are engaging one another atop the glaciated peaks of the Himalayas in Kashmir. The alleged mutilations sparked an angry outcry in India. “Tell Sartaj Aziz to go back,” the Pioneer newspaper said. “It is a question of a nation’s self-esteem.”

The fighting began last month when about 600 guerrillas supporting Kashmiri independence seized mountaintop positions on the Indian side of the Line of Control, the disputed 450-mile border section that runs through Kashmir. India has sent thousands of troops to confront the invaders, but so far has been unable to dislodge them. Hundreds have been killed in the fighting.

Pakistan, which long has supported insurgents inside Jammu and Kashmir state, the Indian-controlled portion of the disputed region, has denied any role in the invading force.

On Friday, Singh accused Pakistan of “involvement, complicity and continued support of aggression in which regular Pakistan troops are participating.”

Indian and Western observers say that the incursion of such a large force into 15,000-foot-high Himalayan peaks could have been achieved only with sophisticated help.

As the two sides traded accusations and denials Friday, Indian and Pakistani gunners pounded each other with artillery fire along the border in Kashmir. Pakistani officials said four civilians were killed in Friday’s shelling.

Despite the deteriorating atmosphere, Singh said India is committed to a dialogue. And Aziz told Chinese leaders Friday that he will seek a peaceful resolution of the Kashmiri conflict.

“We continue to believe that in the ultimate, it is peace that must prevail between the two lands,” Singh said.