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Fresh militant attacks kill one & injure eight in Kashmir |
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December 4, 2000
SRINAGAR--(UNB/AP) - Suspected militants killed one civilian and wounded eight others in fresh attacks in troubled Kashmir even as Pakistan responded to India's temporary cease-fire and curbed firing across the cease-fire line dividing the disputed Himalayan territory between them, police said Sunday. Peace efforts got a further boost as Kashmir separatist leaders, who are trying to put together talks to end more than a decade of violence, said on Sunday that they hope to meet with diplomats from the United States, Pakistan and other countries in New Delhi. They also are likely to meet the representatives of the Indian government in the next few days. In Kashmir, a grenade hurled at a paramilitary Border Security Force patrol on Sunday missed the target and exploded near a group of civilians, wounding six of them, a police statement said. The attack occurred in Sopore, a town nearly 50 kilometers (30 miles) northwest of Srinagar, the summer capital of Kashmit. The wounded civilians have been hospitalized, police said. Also Sunday, suspected militants fired gunshots at a private bus, wounding two young girls, in Qazigund sector, 70 kilometers (45 miles) south of Srinagar, police said. On Saturday night, the militants shot and killed one civilian in Handwara, 75 kilometers (45 miles) northwest of Srinagar, police said. Details were not immediately available. Government forces said they arrested two militants while they were infiltrating into Kashmir from the Pakistani side on Saturday. Two machine-guns, 240 bullets and two hand grenades were recovered from them. Although India's monthlong cease-fire came into effect on Tuesday, the guerrillas have refused to stop fighting, and 19 people have been killed in attacks in Indian-controlled Kashmir since then. But there were signs that could change following Pakistan's cease-fire gesture. On Saturday, Pakistan announced that its troops would exercise "maximum restraint" in Kashmir. On Sunday, an Indian commander said the Indian troops also have been ordered to show maximum restraint as part of the temporary cease-fire announced by Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee. The cease-fire is for the period of the holy Islamic month of Ramadan. "Since Saturday night, the firing has been reduced by 50-60 percent in the Kashmir valley," Maj.-Gen. K. Nagaraj, a top Indian general, told The Associated Press. Omar Farooq, a top decision-maker of the All Parties Hurriyat Conference, the region's main separatist alliance, was headed to New Delhi to join its chairman Abdul Ghani Bhat - an indication that the government and the supporters of Kashmir's independence were moving toward negotiations. The 11-year-old insurgency has killed more than 30,000 people in Kashmir. Islamic guerrillas are fighting to carve out a separate homeland or merge Kashmir with Pakistan. The rebels, based in Pakistan, have so far rejected the cease-fire, but Faroq said he hoped the Pakistani announcement would help them change their stand. India alleges that Pakistan arms and funds the guerrillas and helps them sneak across the mountainous cease-fire line to fight Indian security forces. Pakistan says it has no control over the movement of the rebels, and that it provides them only moral, not material, support. "Everything has manifested itself clearly. Now there has to be a forward movement," Hurriyat chairman Bhat told The Associated Press by telephone from New Delhi. "We will have to make an effort to talk to the boys with guns and convince them." Since Britain carved up the subcontinent at independence in 1947, both India and Pakistan have claimed all of Kashmir and fought two of their three wars over it. A 1972 cease-fire line, known as the line of control, divides Kashmir between the two countries. |