High-resolution satellite images of a religious school run by terror outfit Jaish-e-Mohammad (JeM) in northeastern Pakistan appears to be still standing days after the Indian Air Force claimed its warplanes hit its training camp on the site, says news agency Reuters , quoting Planet Labs Inc, a San Francisco-based private satellite operator.
The images produced by the lab show at least six buildings on the madrasa site on March 4, six days after the air strike, says Reuters.
The images from Planet Labs, which show details as small as 72 cm, offer a clearer look at the structures the government said it attacked, according to Reuters.
The image is virtually unchanged from an April 2018 satellite photo of the facility. There are no discernible holes in the roofs of buildings, no signs of scorching, blown-out walls, displaced trees or other signs of an aerial attack, says Reuters, quoting the lab.
The Ministry of External Affairs and the Ministry of India did not reply to emails sent in the past few days seeking their comment on what is shown in the images, it says.
The town of Balakot, which was targetted by the Indian Air Force on Feb. 26, 2019. | Photo Credit: Satellite image: Google, DigitalGlobe, Landsat / Copernicus, CNES / Airbus via Reuters
Missed the target?
Jeffrey Lewis, director of the East Asia Nonproliferation Project at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies, who has 15 years experience in analysing satellite images of weapons sites and systems, confirmed that the high-resolution satellite pictures showed the structures in question.
“The high-resolution images don't show any evidence of bomb damage,” he said. Mr. Lewis viewed three other high-resolution Planet Labs pictures of the site taken within hours of the images provided to Reuters.
Though the government of India has not publicly disclosed what weapons were used in the air strike, sources told Reuters last week that 12 Mirage 2000 jets carrying 1,000 kg bombs carried out the attack. On Tuesday, a defence official said the aircraft used the 2,000-lb Israeli-made SPICE 2000 glide bomb in the strike.
A warhead of that size is meant to destroy hardened targets such as concrete shelters.
Mr. Lewis and Dave Schmerler, a senior research associate at the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation studies who also analyses satellite images, said weapons that large would have caused obvious damage to the structures visible in the picture.
“If the strike had been successful, given the information we have about what kind of munitions were used, I would expect to see signs that the buildings had been damaged,” Mr. Lewis said. “I just don't see that here.”
Pakistan has disputed India's account, saying the operation was a failure that saw Indian jets, under pressure from Pakistani planes, drop their bombs on a largely empty hillside.
“There has been no damage to any infrastructure or human life as a result of Indian incursion,” Major General Asif Ghafoor, director general of the Pakistan military's press wing, said in a statement to Reuters.
“This has been vindicated by both domestic and international media after visiting the site.”
In two visits to the Balakot area in Pakistan by Reuters reporters last Tuesday and Thursday, and extensive interviews with people in the surrounding area, there was no evidence found of a destroyed camp or of anyone being killed.
Villagers said there had been a series of huge explosions but the bombs appeared to have landed among trees.
Four craters
On the wooded slopes above Jaba, they pointed to four craters and some splintered pine trees, but noted that little other impact from the blasts that jolted them awake about 3 a.m. on Feb. 26.
“It shook everything,” said Abdur Rasheed, a van driver who works in the area. there weren't any human casualties, he added.
Mohammad Saddique from the Jaba Basic Health Unit and Zia Ul Haq, senior medical officer at Tehsil Headquarters Hospital in Balakot, said they had seen no casualties.
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