Dozens of tourist resorts in Indian-controlled Kashmir are closed after deadly attack

SRINAGAR, India (AP) — Authorities in Indian-controlled Kashmir temporarily closed dozens of the tourist resorts in the scenic Himalayan region after last week’s deadly attack on tourists raised tensions between India and Pakistan and led to an intensifying security crackdown in Kashmir.

At least two police officers and three administrative officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity in keeping with departmental policy, said Tuesday that the decision to shut 48 of the 87 government-authorized resorts was a safety precaution. They did not specify how long these places would be out of bounds for visitors.

The decision comes a week after gunmen killed 26 people, most of them Indian tourists, near the resort town of Pahalgam.

The massacre set off tit-for-tat diplomatic measures between India and Pakistan that included cancellation of visas and a recall of diplomats. New Delhi also suspended a crucial water sharing treaty with Islamabad and ordered its border shut with Pakistan. In response, Pakistan has closed its airspace to Indian airlines.

India has described the massacre as a “terror attack” and accused Pakistan of backing it. Pakistan has denied any connection to the attack, and it was claimed by a previously unknown militant group calling itself the Kashmir Resistance.

Some tourists who survived the massacre have told Indian media that the gunmen singled out Hindu men and shot them from close range. The dead included a Nepalese citizen and a local Muslim pony ride operator.

Kashmir is split between India and Pakistan and claimed by both in its entirety. New Delhi describes all militancy in Indian-controlled Kashmir as Pakistan-backed terrorism. Pakistan denies this, and many Muslim Kashmiris consider the militants to be part of a home-grown freedom struggle.

As tensions escalate, cross-border firing between soldiers of India and Pakistan has also increased along the Line of Control, the de facto frontier that separates Kashmiri territory between the two rivals. On Tuesday, the Indian army in a statement said it had responded to “unprovoked” small arms fire from multiple Pakistan army posts for a fifth consecutive night.

The incidents could not be independently verified. In the past, each side has accused the other of starting border skirmishes in the Himalayan region.

Early Wednesday, Pakistan’s Information Minister Attaullah Tarar said Islamabad had credible intelligence that India intended to carry out military action against Pakistan in the next 24-36 hours over the “baseless and concocted allegations of involvement” in the Pahalgam attack.

He said in the statement that Pakistan would respond to any such action and the responsibility for any consequences of the escalation lay with India.

Indian officials had no immediate comment.

The U.S. State Department called for deescalation and said that Secretary of State Marco Rubio would be speaking soon to the Indian and Pakistani foreign ministers.

Pakistani troops shot down a small Indian spy drone that flew hundreds of meters into Pakistani-controlled Kashmir, three Pakistani security officials told The Associated Press on Tuesday, speaking on condition of anonymity as they weren’t allowed to speak to the media. The drone was shot down on Monday in the border town of Bhimber, they said.

Meanwhile, government forces in the region have detained and questioned nearly 2,000 people, officials and residents said. Many of the detained are former rebels fighting against Indian rule and others who officials describe as “over ground workers” of militants, a term authorities use for civilians suspected of associating with insurgents.

Indian soldiers have demolished the family homes of at least nine suspected militants across Kashmir, using explosives.

The region’s top pro-India leaders have supported action against suspected militants but also questioned the demolitions.

Omar Abdullah, the region’s chief minister, said Monday that any heavy-handed tactics against civilians should be avoided. “We should not take any step that will alienate people,” Abdullah told the region’s lawmakers during a legislative session.

Ruhullah Mehdi, a lawmaker from the region in India’s national parliament, termed the demolitions of homes as “collective punishment.”

Indian tourism has flourished in Kashmir after Prime Minister Narendra Modi's government promoted visits to the region with the hope of showing rising tourism numbers as a sign of renewed stability there.

Millions of visitors arrive in Kashmir to see its Himalayan foothills and exquisitely decorated houseboats, despite regular skirmishes between insurgents and government forces. According to official data, close to 3 million tourists visited the region in 2024, a rise from 2.71 million visitors in 2023 and 2.67 million in 2022.

But last week's attack has left many tourists scared and some have left the region. Widespread cancellations are also being reported by tour operators, with some estimates putting the number at more than 1 million.

Associated Press writer Munir Ahmed in Islamabad contributed to this report.

Indian paramilitary soldiers patrol as they guard at a busy market in Srinagar, Indian controlled Kashmir, Tuesday, April 29, 2025. (AP Photo/Mukhtar Khan)

Indian paramilitary soldiers patrol as they guard at a busy market in Srinagar, Indian controlled Kashmir, Tuesday, April 29, 2025. (AP Photo/Mukhtar Khan)

Indian paramilitary soldiers patrol as tourists take pictures at a busy market in Srinagar, Indian controlled Kashmir, Tuesday, April 29, 2025. (AP Photo/Mukhtar Khan)

Indian paramilitary soldiers patrol as they guard at a busy market in Srinagar, Indian controlled Kashmir, Tuesday, April 29, 2025. (AP Photo/Mukhtar Khan)

Indian paramilitary soldiers patrol as they guard at a busy market in Srinagar, Indian controlled Kashmir, Tuesday, April 29, 2025. (AP Photo/Mukhtar Khan)

Indian national Komal breaks down while seeing off her brother and his wife, both Pakistani citizens, at the Attari-Wagah border between India and Pakistan, near Amritsar, India, Tuesday, April 29, 2025. (AP Photo/Prabhjot Gill)

Pakistani national Khalida Hanif, right, and her Indian children display their passports on their return from Pakistan at the Attari-Wagah border between India and Pakistan, near Amritsar, India, Tuesday, April 29, 2025. (AP Photo/Prabhjot Gill)

Indian paramilitary soldiers patrol as they guard at a busy market in Srinagar, Indian controlled Kashmir, Tuesday, April 29, 2025. (AP Photo/Mukhtar Khan)

A locked garden gate is seen in Srinagar after it was closed by authorities as a precautionary safety measure following last week's deadly attack on tourists near the resort town of Pahalgam, Indian controlled Kashmir, Tuesday, April 29, 2025. (AP Photo/Mukhtar Khan)

An Indian paramilitary soldier talks with tourists outside a garden in Srinagar after it was closed by authorities as a precautionary safety measure following last week's deadly attack on tourists near the resort town of Pahalgam, Indian controlled Kashmir, Tuesday, April 29, 2025. (AP Photo/Mukhtar Khan)

A locked garden gate is seen in Srinagar after it was closed by authorities as a precautionary safety measure following last week's deadly attack on tourists near the resort town of Pahalgam, Indian controlled Kashmir, Tuesday, April 29, 2025. (AP Photo/Mukhtar Khan)

An Indian paramilitary soldier guards outside a garden in Srinagar after it was closed by authorities as a precautionary safety measure following last week's deadly attack on tourists near the resort town of Pahalgam, Indian controlled Kashmir, Tuesday, April 29, 2025. (AP Photo/Mukhtar Khan)

A locked garden gate is seen in Srinagar after it was closed by authorities as a precautionary safety measure following last week's deadly attack on tourists near the resort town of Pahalgam, Indian controlled Kashmir, Tuesday, April 29, 2025. (AP Photo/Mukhtar Khan)

Indian paramilitary soldiers guard inside a Mughal garden on the outskirts of Srinagar, Indian controlled Kashmir, Sunday, April. 27, 2025.(AP Photo/Mukhtar Khan)

An Indian paramilitary soldier stands guard inside a Mughal garden on the outskirts of Srinagar, Indian controlled Kashmir, Sunday, April. 27, 2025.(AP Photo/Mukhtar Khan)

WASHINGTON (AP) — Becky Pepper-Jackson finished third in the discus throw in West Virginia last year though she was in just her first year of high school. Now a 15-year-old sophomore, Pepper-Jackson is aware that her upcoming season could be her last.

West Virginia has banned transgender girls like Pepper-Jackson from competing in girls and women's sports, and is among the more than two dozen states with similar laws. Though the West Virginia law has been blocked by lower courts, the outcome could be different at the conservative-dominated Supreme Court, which has allowed multiple restrictions on transgender people to be enforced in the past year.

The justices are hearing arguments Tuesday in two cases over whether the sports bans violate the Constitution or the landmark federal law known as Title IX that prohibits sex discrimination in education. The second case comes from Idaho, where college student Lindsay Hecox challenged that state's law.

Decisions are expected by early summer.

President Donald Trump's Republican administration has targeted transgender Americans from the first day of his second term, including ousting transgender people from the military and declaring that gender is immutable and determined at birth.

Pepper-Jackson has become the face of the nationwide battle over the participation of transgender girls in athletics that has played out at both the state and federal levels as Republicans have leveraged the issue as a fight for athletic fairness for women and girls.

“I think it’s something that needs to be done,” Pepper-Jackson said in an interview with The Associated Press that was conducted over Zoom. “It’s something I’m here to do because ... this is important to me. I know it’s important to other people. So, like, I’m here for it.”

She sat alongside her mother, Heather Jackson, on a sofa in their home just outside Bridgeport, a rural West Virginia community about 40 miles southwest of Morgantown, to talk about a legal fight that began when she was a middle schooler who finished near the back of the pack in cross-country races.

Pepper-Jackson has grown into a competitive discus and shot put thrower. In addition to the bronze medal in the discus, she finished eighth among shot putters.

She attributes her success to hard work, practicing at school and in her backyard, and lifting weights. Pepper-Jackson has been taking puberty-blocking medication and has publicly identified as a girl since she was in the third grade, though the Supreme Court's decision in June upholding state bans on gender-affirming medical treatment for minors has forced her to go out of state for care.

Her very improvement as an athlete has been cited as a reason she should not be allowed to compete against girls.

“There are immutable physical and biological characteristic differences between men and women that make men bigger, stronger, and faster than women. And if we allow biological males to play sports against biological females, those differences will erode the ability and the places for women in these sports which we have fought so hard for over the last 50 years,” West Virginia's attorney general, JB McCuskey, said in an AP interview. McCuskey said he is not aware of any other transgender athlete in the state who has competed or is trying to compete in girls or women’s sports.

Despite the small numbers of transgender athletes, the issue has taken on outsize importance. The NCAA and the U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committees banned transgender women from women's sports after Trump signed an executive order aimed at barring their participation.

The public generally is supportive of the limits. An Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research poll conducted in October 2025 found that about 6 in 10 U.S. adults “strongly” or “somewhat” favored requiring transgender children and teenagers to only compete on sports teams that match the sex they were assigned at birth, not the gender they identify with, while about 2 in 10 were “strongly” or “somewhat” opposed and about one-quarter did not have an opinion.

About 2.1 million adults, or 0.8%, and 724,000 people age 13 to 17, or 3.3%, identify as transgender in the U.S., according to the Williams Institute at the UCLA School of Law.

Those allied with the administration on the issue paint it in broader terms than just sports, pointing to state laws, Trump administration policies and court rulings against transgender people.

"I think there are cultural, political, legal headwinds all supporting this notion that it’s just a lie that a man can be a woman," said John Bursch, a lawyer with the conservative Christian law firm Alliance Defending Freedom that has led the legal campaign against transgender people. “And if we want a society that respects women and girls, then we need to come to terms with that truth. And the sooner that we do that, the better it will be for women everywhere, whether that be in high school sports teams, high school locker rooms and showers, abused women’s shelters, women’s prisons.”

But Heather Jackson offered different terms to describe the effort to keep her daughter off West Virginia's playing fields.

“Hatred. It’s nothing but hatred,” she said. "This community is the community du jour. We have a long history of isolating marginalized parts of the community.”

Pepper-Jackson has seen some of the uglier side of the debate on display, including when a competitor wore a T-shirt at the championship meet that said, “Men Don't Belong in Women's Sports.”

“I wish these people would educate themselves. Just so they would know that I’m just there to have a good time. That’s it. But it just, it hurts sometimes, like, it gets to me sometimes, but I try to brush it off,” she said.

One schoolmate, identified as A.C. in court papers, said Pepper-Jackson has herself used graphic language in sexually bullying her teammates.

Asked whether she said any of what is alleged, Pepper-Jackson said, “I did not. And the school ruled that there was no evidence to prove that it was true.”

The legal fight will turn on whether the Constitution's equal protection clause or the Title IX anti-discrimination law protects transgender people.

The court ruled in 2020 that workplace discrimination against transgender people is sex discrimination, but refused to extend the logic of that decision to the case over health care for transgender minors.

The court has been deluged by dueling legal briefs from Republican- and Democratic-led states, members of Congress, athletes, doctors, scientists and scholars.

The outcome also could influence separate legal efforts seeking to bar transgender athletes in states that have continued to allow them to compete.

If Pepper-Jackson is forced to stop competing, she said she will still be able to lift weights and continue playing trumpet in the school concert and jazz bands.

“It will hurt a lot, and I know it will, but that’s what I’ll have to do,” she said.

Heather Jackson, left, and Becky Pepper-Jackson pose for a photograph outside of the U.S. Supreme Court in Washington, Sunday, Jan. 11, 2026. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)

Heather Jackson, left, and Becky Pepper-Jackson pose for a photograph outside of the U.S. Supreme Court in Washington, Sunday, Jan. 11, 2026. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)

Becky Pepper-Jackson poses for a photograph outside of the U.S. Supreme Court in Washington, Sunday, Jan. 11, 2026. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)

The Supreme Court stands is Washington, Friday, Jan. 9, 2026. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)

FILE - Protestors hold signs during a rally at the state capitol in Charleston, W.Va., on March 9, 2023. (AP Photo/Chris Jackson, file)