World
Pakistan calls for ‘neutral’ investigation into Kashmir attack
Pakistan has called for a “neutral” investigation into the killings of tourists in Indian-administered Kashmir that New Delhi has blamed on Islamabad, saying it was willing to cooperate and favoured peace.
India has identified two of the three suspected attackers as Pakistani, though Islamabad has denied any role in the attack on Tuesday that killed 25 Indians and one Nepali national.
“Pakistan is fully prepared to cooperate with any neutral investigators to ensure that the truth is uncovered and justice is served,” said Pakistan’s interior minister, Mohsin Naqvi, on Saturday.
“Pakistan remains committed to peace, stability and the following of international norms but will not compromise on its sovereignty,” he told a news conference.
Pakistan’s Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif said, “The recent tragedy in Pahalgam is yet another example of this perpetual blame game, which must come to a grinding halt.”
India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi has pledged to pursue the attackers to “the ends of the earth” and said that those who planned and carried it out “will be punished beyond their imagination”.
Meanwhile, calls continue to grow from Indian politicians and others for military retaliation against Pakistan.
After the attack, India and Pakistan unleashed a host of measures against each other, with Pakistan closing its airspace to Indian airlines, and India suspending the 1960 Indus Waters Treaty that regulates water-sharing from the Indus River and its tributaries.
The two sides, who both fully claim Kashmir while partly governing it, have also exchanged fire across their de facto border for two straight days after four years of relative calm.
The Indian Army said it had responded to “unprovoked” small arms fire from multiple Pakistan Army posts that started around midnight on Friday along the 740km (460-mile) de facto border separating the Indian and Pakistani areas of Kashmir. It reported no casualties.
Pakistan’s military has not yet commented on the exchange of fire.
Maleeha Lodhi, a former Pakistani diplomat, told Al Jazeera that there was “a sombre mood” in Pakistan with a great deal of apprehension about what might happen next.
Lodhi said, “The nuclear neighbours are on the brink of a more dangerous confrontation, so there are fears, especially because of speeches by Prime Minister Modi as well as the Indian media.”
The former ambassador stressed that, due to this rhetoric, there is a fear that India might take “kinetic action” against Pakistan.
“That would mean a very strong, robust response from Pakistan,” she said.
“So, the fear and the apprehension are really focused on the fact that we could be on the threshold of a full-blown crisis,” Lodhi concluded.
Indians living in Jammu and Kashmir’s border village R S Pura have also begun cleaning out community bunkers as diplomatic tensions with Pakistan escalate.
“We are the residents of border areas. Whatever happens in India, our areas will be the first to be affected,” resident Balvir Kaur told the Reuters news agency.
“We are preparing ourselves so that we are ready if anything happens. The Indian government would not need to think whether its people living in the borders are safe. We do not want to be a burden for them.”
In an editorial published on Saturday, Pakistan’s Dawn news outlet said, “It is time again to give diplomacy a chance as neither Pakistan nor India can afford war.”
The editorial added that “these are dangerous times in the subcontinent, and there is a need for both Pakistan and India to show restraint, and handle the post-Pahalgam developments with sense.”
Meanwhile, Indian security forces have continued their hunt for the suspects and have demolished the Indian-administered Kashmir houses of at least five suspected rebels, including one they believe took part in the latest attack.
Pieces of broken glass littered the site of one such house in Murram village in Pulwama district on Saturday. Locals said they had not seen Ehsan Ahmed Sheikh, a suspected fighter whose house was destroyed, in the past three years.
“Nobody knows where he is,” neighbour Sameer Ahmed told Reuters.
“Ehsan’s family have lost their home. They will suffer for this, not him.”
But citing “interest of national security”, Indian authorities have declared a ban on live coverage of the large-scale military and security operations.
United States President Donald Trump has pledged there will be no tolls for passage through the Strait of Hormuz, unless they are collected by his own country.
Trump’s statement, made in a Saturday afternoon post on Truth Social, is the latest sign that a recently signed memorandum of understanding (MOU) may be unravelling.
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“There will be NO TOLLS in the Hormuz Strait for 60 days during the Cease Fire Period, and there will be NO TOLLS after the 60 day period has expired,” Trump wrote, “unless they are imposed by and for the United States of America.”
Since the US and Israel launched a war against Iran on February 28, Iran has successfully used the Strait of Hormuz as a pressure point, closing the strategic waterway to traffic.
But under the terms of Wednesday’s ceasefire memorandum, the strait is supposed to reopen for an interim period of 60 days. During that time, Iran is barred from charging vessels for passage.
On Saturday, however, Iran’s joint military command said it had closed the Strait of Hormuz, citing a “clear breach” of the memorandum’s commitments.
US Central Command (CENTCOM), the agency that oversees military operations in the region, denied that report and maintained that the traffic continues to flow through the waterway.
The Strait of Hormuz has long been a flashpoint in the conflict between the US and Iran. Nearly 20 percent of the world’s oil and natural gas is transported through the strait, as well as about 30 percent of the global fertiliser trade.
Closure of the strait has caused global fuel costs to soar and has tested agricultural sectors across the world.
Trump had responded to Iran’s chokehold over the strait by imposing a US naval blockade on Iran’s ports in the region.
But that naval blockade was lifted under the terms of Wednesday’s memorandum. The deal also paused fighting on all fronts in the regional conflict, including in Lebanon.
The memorandum, though, was not intended as a long-term deal. It serves as a launching point for negotiations on key issues, including the future of Iran’s nuclear programme.
Several points of divergence also went unaddressed in the memorandum. Nowhere does the memo say that future tolls cannot be collected from the strait after the 60-day period expires.
Before the war, there was no charge for passage through the strait. Trump himself said in an interview with The New York Times that the waterway should remain “permanently toll-free”.
But he appeared to reverse course in Saturday’s post, once again floating the possibility that the US could extract tolls in the strait, while barring Iran from doing so.
No fees should be levied, Trump wrote, “unless they are imposed by and for the United States of America, should the deal not be completed”.
He explained that such a charge would compensate the US “for services rendered as the Guardian Angel to the countries of the Middle East for purposes of both past, present, and future reimbursement of costs”.
Trump used similar language in his New York Times interview earlier this week, floating the US becoming “the guardian of the Middle East” in exchange for 20 percent of its revenue.
Saturday’s post is not the first time Trump has mused about the US imposing tolls in the strait, either.
In April, for instance, he discussed the idea with reporters, saying, “What about us charging tolls? I’d rather do that than let them have them. Why shouldn’t we? We’re the winner. We won.”
There has been no indication that Trump’s plans have been officially presented to countries in the region, many of whom have struck a careful balance in their dealings with both the US and Iran during the war.
Iranian officials, meanwhile, have repeatedly said they will not rule out imposing tolls in the strait, framing the issue as a matter of sovereignty and regional negotiation. The strait sits between Iran and Oman.
Further discussions are expected on the matter in the coming weeks.
But such negotiations have been thrown into jeopardy amid ongoing Israeli military operations in Lebanon, which threaten to violate Wednesday’s ceasefire memorandum.
Iran claimed that Saturday’s closure of the strait was a result of new Israeli attacks in southern Lebanon, which killed dozens of people after the ceasefire was announced.
Iranian officials have also said that any upcoming talks should focus on proper implementation of the initial memorandum, and that the 60-day negotiating period stipulated in Wednesday’s deal would begin after that was settled.
Pakistan, a top mediator between the US and Iran, has said that follow-up talks are set to begin in Switzerland on Sunday.
Switzerland’s Federal Department of Foreign Affairs has confirmed that an Iranian delegation, led by parliamentary Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf and Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi, has already arrived for the negotiations.
On the US side, Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner, special envoy Steve Witkoff and Vice President JD Vance are expected to attend.
Vance departed for Switzerland late Saturday.
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June 19, 2026
World
Man charged with attempted murder, released after allegedly forcing toddler into crocodile enclosure at zoo
Man FORCES child into crocodile enclosure
A British man has been arrested after allegedly forcing a 3-year-old boy into a crocodile enclosure at a zoo. The child suffered critical injuries, and authorities say the suspect did not know the boy as the investigation continues.
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A man was released from custody on Friday after he was charged with attempted murder for allegedly forcing a 3-year-old boy into a crocodile enclosure at a zoo.
Cambridgeshire police said that the man, who remains unidentified, wasn’t fit to be interviewed.
The boy suffered critical injuries in the incident at Johnsons of Old Hurst, a farm and zoo in Huntingdon, England, north of London.
The 30-year-old man will remain on bail until Sept. 30, pending further inquiries.
GEORGIA MOM’S WALMART TRIP DEVOLVES INTO ‘TUG-OF-WARRING’ IN DESPERATE ATTEMPT TO SAVE HER SON
A crocodile rests inside an enclosure at Johnsons of Old Hurst, a farm and zoo in Old Hurst, Cambridgeshire, Britain, on April 14, 2026. (Dorota Dee Trajdos/Reuters)
“The man, who is not known to the victim, was assessed as not being fit for interview,” police said in a statement.
The boy is in stable condition, after reportedly suffering a broken arm and pelvis.
He was saved from the crocodile by Tracey Johnson, the wife of the zoo’s owner.
MOTHER JUMPS INTO WATER TO SAVE 4-YEAR-OLD DAUGHTER WHO FELL BETWEEN CRUISE SHIP AND DOCK
“I know Tracey very well and she’s a lovely lady and it’s nothing more than I’d expect from her,” a local told BBC News. “She’d always put her own life at risk to save someone else. She’s an extraordinary lady and very brave.
The villager added that Johnson put herself in “immense danger” during the rescue.
The owners said their tropical house would remain closed until further notice.
Crocodiles rest inside an enclosure at Johnsons of Old Hurst farm and zoo in Old Hurst, Cambridgeshire, Britain, on April 14, 2026. (Dorota Dee Trajdos/Reuters)
“Our thoughts and prayers are with the boy and his family following the incident that occurred today,” the owners wrote on social media.
Johnsons of Old Hurst is a farm and zoo north of London in Huntingdon, England. (Google Maps)
Huntingdonshire district councillor Charlotte Lowe said she couldn’t “fathom how it’s happened because they’ve got all the right protection and safety equipment, for want of a better word, in there,” The Guardian reported.
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Fox News Digital has reached out to the Cambridgeshire Constabulary for comment.
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