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Avalanche Buries More Than 117 Pakistani Soldiers

Brian Padden | Islamabad April 07, 2012

In Pakistan, rescue efforts are underway following an avalanche that smashed into a military base that buried more than 117 soldiers early Saturday on a Himalayan glacier along the India border. Rescue workers are racing against time to find survivors in this harsh climate and remote location.

Military authorities say the avalanche hit the base Saturday morning in the mountainous Siachen Glacier region of northern Kashmir. Kashmir is claimed in full by Pakistan and India. Both countries have military outposts in the region that is known as the world's highest battlefield.

Officials says helicopters, search dogs, and troops have been deployed to rescue the trapped military personnel. And a team of doctors and paramedics has also been rushed to the 6,000 meters high peak, where temperatures can plummet to minus 70 degrees Celsius.

Wajid Shamsul Hasan, Pakistan's High Commissioner in the United Kingdom, says there were only about 150 people in the military base but it is a high risk area were the inhospitable climate and avalanche-prone terrain have claimed more lives than gunfire.

"There are not there large troops as a matter of fact, it's small contingent on both sides and they're just border police, those sort of things but actually the position is that such incidents do take place on both sides and they claim more lives as I said in natural disasters and weather victims rather than war victims,” he said.

Since 1984 there had been intermittent skirmishes along the border until both sides agreed to a cease-fire in 2003. An estimated 10,000 and 20,000 combined Indian and Pakistani forces face off against each other in the mountainous region.

The nuclear armed rivals have fought three wars since the partition of the subcontinent after independence from Britain in 1947. Two of the wars have been about Kashmir.

The avalanche hit on the eve of a meeting scheduled between Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari and Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Sunday. It will be the first visit to India by a Pakistani head of state since 2005.