Gunmen kill 24 tourists in India’s J&K

At least 24 people were killed in Indian-administered Jammu and Kashmir (J&K) when gunmen opened fire on tourists yesterday, a senior police officer told AFP, with authorities calling it the worst attack on civilians in years.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi decried the "heinous act" in the summer retreat of Pahalgam, pledging the attackers "will be brought to justice".

A tour guide told AFP he reached the scene after hearing gunfire and transported some of the wounded away on horseback.

"I saw a few men lying on the ground looking like they were dead," said Waheed, who gave only one name. The attack targeted tourists in Pahalgam, which lies about 90 kilometres (55 miles) by road from the key city of Srinagar.

The senior police officer in the region, speaking on condition of anonymity, described a massacre in which at least 24 people had been killed.

No group has claimed responsibility for the attack, but rebels in the Muslim-majority region have waged an insurgency since 1989.

They are seeking independence or a merger with Pakistan -- which controls a smaller part of the Kashmir region and, like India, claims it in full.

The killings comes a day after Modi met with US Vice President JD Vance, who is on a four-day tour of India.

Chief Minister Omar Abdullah said that "the attack is much larger than anything we've seen directed at civilians in recent years", with the death toll "still being ascertained".

"This attack on our visitors is an abomination," he said in a statement. "The perpetrators of this attack are animals, inhuman and worthy of contempt."

India's interior minister Amit Shah said he was flying to the site of attack.

"Those involved in this dastardly act of terror will not be spared, and we will come down heavily on the perpetrators with the harshest consequences," Shah said in a statement.