Indian Air Force chief Rakesh Kumar Singh Bhadauria was at the Pearl Harbour-Hickam military base in the United States on Wednesday, when an American Navy sailor shot dead two people there before killing himself, PTI reported. The air chief marshal is in Hawaii to attend a conference of the air chiefs of 20 Pacific Ocean littoral countries. The security situation in the Indo-Pacific region will be discussed at the meeting.
Indian Air Force spokesperson Group Captain Anupam Banerjee told Hindustan Times that the air chief marshal and his team were safe. They are staying at the air force base in the area. “The [shooting] incident was at the nearby naval base,” an Air Force officer told the newspaper on the condition of anonymity. “However, security was increased as a precautionary measure for some time.”
US Navy spokesperson Rear Admiral Robert Chadwick said one person wounded in the shooting was in stable condition in a local hospital.
The shooting reportedly took place near the south entrance of the joint base on the southern shore of Oahu island. The incident occurred three days before the 78th anniversary of the 1941 Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor that left 2,403 US service members dead. Subsequently, the US declared a war on Japan and formally entered World War II.
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