M A I N   N E W S

Holed-up militant killed, 19 rescued from hotel
Tribune News Service and Agencies

Srinagar, August 28
At least four persons, including a militant-turned-politician, Javed Shah, were killed in a night-long operation after the militants made a vain attempt to storm the Central Telegraph Office (CTO) in the Lal Chowk area here last evening.

The DIG (Operations), BSF, Mr Des Raj, and five police personnel were injured in the initial grenade attack followed by firing in front of the CTO, the DGP, Mr Gopal Sharma, said.

Mr Sharma said the bodies of Javed Ahmad Shah, whose newspaper office was adjacent to Greenway Hotel, and two of his associates, Bagh Hussain (PSO) and Somnath Dhar, were recovered. The body of an unidentified person, suspected to be one of the two militants, was also recovered from the debris. An AK rifle was recovered from the slain militant, the DGP added. The body of another militant, suspected to be involved in the attack, could be in the debris that was being cleared, the DGP said. He said 19 persons, including five trapped in the office of Javed Hussain Shah, were rescued by the police and the security forces.

The Deputy Prime Minister, Mr L.K. Advani, said the Lashkar-e-Toiba outfit had claimed the responsibility for the attack. It was confirmed by Mr Gopal Sharma, who added that the Al-Nasreen group of the outfit was responsible for the attack.

It was a night-long gunbattle between the holed-up militants and the security forces, which began within a couple of hours of the commencement of the two-day long Inter State Council Meet at the SKICC, 5 km from the spot yesterday afternoon. The residence of the Chief Minister, Mufti Mohammed Sayeed, located about 200 yards away, was sealed off by the security forces.

The encounter ended at about 6.30 am today after nearly 12 hours when the three-storeyed building housing the Greenway Hotel and other offices was gutted. The holed-up militants kept on hurling grenades towards the security forces between 2 am and 6 am. Several other explosions took place while the building was being gutted. The fire tenders were pressed into service to prevent the fire from engulfing other adjacent buildings in the vicinity of the Pradesh Congress Committee office. As the fire-fighters were engaged in dousing the flames a jawan’s gun went off accidentally injuring fireman.

Many lives were saved as militants had not been able to cut the communication lines which were effectively used by those trapped in their offices. Many trapped media persons were able to establish contact with their colleagues outside to facilitate their rescue.