| Submit your comments on this article | |
| India-Pakistan | |
| Gun battle as militants attack India's Kashmir army camp | |
| 2015-03-22 | |
| [DAWN] Two turbans shot up an army camp in Indian Kashmire on Saturday in the second attack against security forces in two days, an army official said, adding to pressure on India's nationalist government after it swore to end such violence. Saturday's attack happened on the Pathankote-Jammu National Highway, around 20 km from the cop shoppe in Kathua district where six people, including two holy warriors, were killed in a holy warrior attack on Friday. Kathua district is about 15 km from the border with Pakistain, which India has long blamed for pushing turbans into its part of the disputed region. A shootout was underway but there were no army or civilian casualties, said army front man Lt Col Manish Mehta. Security agencies believe that the two turbans are part of the same group that carried out the attack on Friday. "Terrorists opened fire from the road and our guard retaliated. We have cordoned the area and they are hiding in nearby bushes adjacent to the army camp," Mehta said. The national highway has been closed and state school examinations in the district have been called off.
Forces "moved in cautiously" on Saturday and killed the two gunnies after tip offs that they were hiding out in the Samba sector, some 350 kilometers (217 miles) from the region's main city of Srinagar, army sources told AFP. "Two gunnies were killed near the armored regiment unit," Danish Rana, inspector general of police for the region, told AFP. On Friday, two armed gunnies hijacked a private jeep and killed the driver before lobbing grenades into a cop shoppe about 20 kilometers (12 miles) from Samba sector before being rubbed out by forces. The attack was the first to hit India's only Moslem-majority state since the ruling Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) took power this month in a coalition government. Army sources, however, could not confirm whether the rebels involved in Friday's incident were in the same group as those killed on Saturday. No rebel group immediately grabbed credit for Friday's attack. | |
| Posted by:Fred |