19 die in Kashmir violence
Bus accident leaves 44 dead
Afp, Ap, Srinagar/ Jammu
Nineteen people were killed in the latest violence in Indian Kashmir, four of them soldiers gunned down in a firefight with suspected rebels on the de facto border between India and Pakistan, officials said yesterday. Two suspected rebels also died in the early morning gunbattle, in northern Machil sector, army spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Vijay Batra told AFP. He said the gunbattle erupted when a group of suspected militants sneaked across the Line of Control (LoC) at Machil from Pakistan-administered Kashmir. "Three other soldiers were injured during the fighting," Batra said. "The operation in the area is continuing," he said, adding that army reinforcements had been rushed to the area. India accuses Pakistan of arming and pushing militants into Kashmir. Pakistan insists it only provides moral and diplomatic support to militants it regards as freedom fighters engaged in a struggle for self-determination. The Indian army says more than 100 rebel infiltrators have been killed along the LoC since January this year. Meanwhile, Indian troops shot dead nine rebels in four separate encounters in the southern districts of Doda, Poonch, Udhampur and Anantnag late Thursday and early Friday, a police spokesman said. Separately another rebel was killed in northern Kupwara district, of which Machil is an important sector. In other clashes, an Indian soldier was killed in an ambush by militants in Doda district and a Muslim girl and a man were gunned down by suspected rebels in Pulwama and Anantnag districts, police said. The Himalayan region is in the grip of a 16-year-old insurgency that has so far left more than 44,000 people dead by official count. Separatists put the death toll at twice as high. Meanwhile, a bus accident in India's portion of Kashmir has left 44 people dead and 42 others injured, police said Friday. The heavily overcrowded bus veered out of control on Thursday and plunged down a mountain road near the town of Tattapani, a town 100 miles north of Jammu, winter capital of Jammu-Kashmir state, Inspector General of Police S.P. Vaid. Police, soldiers and villagers searched the thickly wooded hill terrain through the night, pulling out more bodies to reach a total of 44, said Vaid. Another 42 passengers were injured, some seriously, he said.
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