Jammu and Kashmir Encounter Ends, 17 Militants Killed

Srinagar: The fierce encounter between militants and security forces in Jammu and Kashmir’s Kupwara district has finally ended, with six more militants killed on Tuesday taking the death toll in the gunbattle to 25. Security forces are carrying out combing operations there.

“The hand-to-hand gunfights have ended,” said Army spokesman JS Brar.

“The militants most likely consisted of an infiltrating column as well as the terrorists who had come to receive them,” Brar said, adding the operation was based on “sound intelligence inputs”.

Seventeen militants and eight Army personnel, including a Major, were killed in the encounter which began on March 20 on higher reaches of the Shamsabari range in Harfada forest, a defence spokesman said.

Four soldiers and five militants were killed on Monday while an ultra died a day before. On Saturday, four troops, including Major Mohit Sharma, and two insurgents, were killed.

The gunfights were first reported on Saturday and followed a cross-border exchange of fire between Indian and Pakistani troops that left one Indian soldier wounded.

The latest death toll was the highest in months in the troubled region and came at a time of heightened tensions between the nuclear-armed neighbours following last November’s deadly Islamist militant attacks on Mumbai.

The funeral of one of the Indian troops killed in the fighting was also held on Tuesday and drew a big turnout from Kashmiri residents, witnesses said.

The dead soldier, a Shiite Muslim from a village northeast of Srinagar, died on Monday during a heavy exchange of fire with rebels.

Pakistan and India agreed to a ceasefire along the Line of Control in 2003 and have since held slow-moving peace negotiations.