India has used drones to hit Karachi, Lahore and other major cities, claims Pakistan Army

India has conducted a series of drone strikes in Lahore, Karachi and other locations, the Pakistani Army said on Thursday. Security personnel cordon off a street near a site after a drone attack on Lahore on May 8, 2025.(AFP)

The Pakistan Civil Aviation Authority said Karachi airport was closed until 6pm (local time), while Islamabad and Lahore were briefly shut “for operational reasons”.

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The drones were launched a day after Indian armed forces carried out missile strikes early on Wednesday on nine terror targets in Pakistan and Pakistan-occupied Kashmir, including the Jaish-e-Mohammad stronghold of Bahawalpur and Lashkar-e-Taiba's base Muridke in retaliation for the Pahalgam terror attack. The military strikes were carried out under 'Operation Sindoor' two weeks after the massacre of 26 civilians in Jammu and Kashmir's Pahalgam.

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Pakistan military spokesperson Ahmed Sharif Chaudhry claimed India sent Israeli Harop drones to multiple locations, including the two largest cities of Karachi and Lahore.

"Last night, India showed another act of aggression by sending drones to multiple locations," Chaudhry said from the army's headquarters in Rawalpindi.

“One managed to engage in a military target near Lahore,” he said, adding that four troops in the city were injured.

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"Indian drones continue to be sent into Pakistan airspace...(India) will continue to pay dearly for this naked aggression," he said.

He earlier said the operation was ongoing.

The Indian military also thwarted attempts by Pakistan forces to hit several military targets in 15 cities in the country’s north and west using missiles and drones, and targeted Pakistan’s air defence network at several locations in that country with the one in Lahore being destroyed in the counter-attack, the defence ministry said.

“Indian response has been in the same domain with same intensity as Pakistan... It has been reliably learnt that an air defence system at Lahore has been neutralised,” the ministry said in a statement, as tensions rose further between the nuclear-armed neighbours who have fought four wars.