M A I N   N E W S

4 cops killed in Sopore ambush
Phone call lured policemen into trap ySecond big attack in Kashmir this year
Majid Jahangir/TNS

Srinagar, April 26
Four policemen were gunned down after they walked into a well-planned ambush near Sopore town in north Kashmir on Friday evening. The attack, which ended in three minutes, shocked the policemen who could not even retaliate. The militants, believed to be three in number, also took away the assault rifles of the policemen before escaping. A top police official said a phone call led the men into the “trap” at a village near volatile Sopore town, 55 km from here.

“Preliminary investigation suggests a situation was created in which the policemen got trapped,” Inspector General Police for Kashmir zone Abdul Ghani Mir, who visited the attack site, said.

Police sources said a phone call was received at Potkhaw police post around 5 pm informing the officials about the movement of “cattle thief” in Haigam village.

Seven persons, including a sarpanch, have been detained for questioning. Sarpanch Ghulam Mohammad Mir allegedly made the call that trapped the four policemen.

“A police party of four policemen led by a head constable rushed to the village in an armoured vehicle. When three of them stepped out of the vehicle in Peer Mohalla Haigam at 5.20 pm, militants opened indiscriminate fire resulting in their death. Then, the police driver was dragged out of the vehicle by the militants and shot from point-blank range,” sources said.

A police official said that when gunshots rang out, personnel at Putkah police post called their colleagues who had gone to the village.

“But no one picked up the phone. When we rushed to the village, we found that the village was deserted and the bodies were lying in a pool of blood,” he said. The slain cops have been identified as head constable Abdul Rahim, constable Mudasir, Special Police Officers Gulshan Ahmad and Mudasir Ahmad Parry.

The attack took place days after top Lashkar commander Fahadullah of Multan, Pakistan, was arrested from a nearby locality.

The Friday attack is the second major attack this year in Kashmir. On March 13, a fidayeen (suicide) attack, first after a gap of three years, left five CRPF personnel and two militants dead at Bemina in the city here.

Chief Minister Omar Abdullah has condemned the killings and described it as an act of cowards.