M A I N   N E W S

2 Ikhwan men among 4 killed
Tribune News Service and agencies

SRINAGAR. April 4 — Four persons were killed and three injured when masked militants opened fire on a taxi in Pulwama district of south Kashmir today, the police said.

Elsewhere in the valley, three militants, including a foreigner, were killed and two arrested as security personnel smashed several of their hideouts, even as militants made an attempt to blow up a security picket in Srinagar today, an official spokesman said.

Masked gunmen fired upon a taxi at Trisal village, 4 km from Pulwama town, this afternoon, causing the death of four passengers.

An official spokesman said the deceased included two counter-insurgents associated with the Ikhwan outfit and a revenue official who were killed in a shootout in the area.

Giving details of the incident, the spokesman said militants opened heavy fire on a taxi carrying the Ikhwan activists around 1200 hours, killing two occupants — Abdul Salam Pal and Abdul Gani Sheikh.

The attack on the vehicle followed a shootout in which two pedestrians, Mohammad Sidiq Malik, a revenue official, and Mohammad Shaban Bhat were killed and three, including a woman, injured, he said.

The forces gunned down a foreign mercenary associated with the Harkat-ul-Mujahideen outfit in an encounter at Nowgam in Verinag area of Anantnag district in south Kashmir today.

The militant, identified as Mohammad Saleem Blouch of occupied Kashmir, had taken shelter in the house of Ghulam Qadir which was raided by the security forces early today.

The spokesman said the militant was asked to surrender, but he opened fire and in the retaliatory action got killed. The house was damaged in the incident.

An assault rifle and ammunition were recovered from the slain militant.

In another encounter, the security forces gunned down a local militant, Ikhlaq Ahmad during search operations at Chaka-upper Dandi in Doda district.

The spokesman said militants hurled a grenade towards a security picket at Nawabazar in Srinagar today.

The grenade, which was aimed at blowing up the picket did not explode and was later defused by experts.

Official sources said troops of the Rashitriya Rifles as a part of their offensive against militants cordoned off vast areas of Nowgam, Doru and Verinag in south Kashmir early this morning.

Official sources said there were reports of foreign militants hiding in the woods of Pirpanjal in south Kashmir for some time. The forces killed a militant during a search operation at Doda last evening.

An indefinite curfew continued to be enforced in and around Anantnag today, even as the authorities ordered a judicial probe into yesterday’s police firing at Barakpora that left seven dead and 10 injured.

Meanwhile, defying curfew restrictions, residents of Achhabal town in Anantnag district today held noisy demonstrations against the killing of several villagers in police firing yesterday, official sources said.

At least 2,500 protesters raised anti-government and anti-security forces slogans and demanded handing over of the bodies of the firing victims, the sources said.

Life remained crippled due to a general strike called by the separatist All-Party Kashmir Hurriyat Conference (APKHC) and the Jammu and Kashmir High Court Bar Association in protest against the killings.