India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi has vowed to “identify, track and punish” the people responsible for gunning down more than two dozen tourists in the disputed northern region of Kashmir, an atrocity that shocked Indians and fanned fears of a conflict with Pakistan.

At least 26 people were killed and 17 wounded in Tuesday’s attack in Pahalgam, a tourist site in Kashmir, which both India and Pakistan claim and partly occupy, confronting each other along a militarised “Line of Control”. India has downgraded ties with Pakistan over the attack.

“I say to the whole world, India will identify, track and punish every terrorist and their backers,” said Modi, speaking in English in the Indian state of Bihar. “We will pursue them to the ends of the earth.