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21 killed in Kashmir rebel attacks©Associated Press
© St. Petersburg Times, JAMMU, India -- Islamic rebels blew up a police jeep and fought gunbattles with Indian security forces in several areas of Kashmir on Saturday. At least 21 people were killed and 30 wounded. The attacks came as most schools, offices and shops in Srinagar, the summer capital of Jammu-Kashmir, closed to protest the presence of Indian troops in the Himalayan state. The All Party Hurriyat Conference, a coalition of Kashmiri separatist parties, called the strike. Four police officers were killed when their jeep was destroyed by a land mine, police spokesman Devinder Sharma said. The attack took place in Kathua, about 110 miles southeast of Jammu, the state's winter capital. The largest of the guerrilla groups in Kashmir said it carried out the attack, which injured three people. Seventeen people, three soldiers and 14 militants, were killed in seven gunbattles, including one in Chadura, 12 miles west of Srinagar. Soldiers in Chadura killed one militant and were seeking another believed to be hiding in a mosque, said Deputy Inspector General S.S. Bhullar of the Border Security Force. Houses around the mosque were evacuated. Meanwhile, at least 25 people were injured when guerrillas threw a grenade at a security patrol in Srinagar, a police official said. Twenty were civilians. About a dozen Islamic militant groups have been fighting Indian security forces in Kashmir since 1989. They are seeking Kashmir's independence or merger with Pakistan, which, like Kashmir, is mostly Muslim. India is predominantly Hindu. The insurgency has claimed at least 30,000 lives, according to the government; human rights activists say the death toll is twice that. India says Pakistan continues to arm and train Islamic militants at camps in Pakistani-controlled areas of the disputed region. India says the aid contradicts Pakistan's claim to support the U.S.-led campaign against terrorism. "There are scores of these training camps, and there is no evidence that they have been shut down," Defense Minister George Fernandes said. "From some of them, activity may have been shifted to another place to demonstrate to the Americans that "See, we had a camp here and now it's gone,' " Fernandes said. "I don't have any reason to believe that that there is any reduction in their efforts to train, equip and export militants."
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From the Times wire desk
From the AP |
