Christian Message Boards: More Rebel Violence in Indian Kashmir, 21 Killed

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By Sheikh Mushtaq

SRINAGAR, India (June 16) - Twenty-one people, including five Hindu villagers, were killed on Sunday in several incidents of separatist violence in Indian Kashmir, police said.

The violence comes as tension between nuclear rivals India and Pakistan has started to ease after U.S.-led international efforts to pull them back from the brink of a fourth war.

Police said suspected Muslim rebels shot dead five Hindu villagers in Udhampur district of the Himalayan region on Sunday.

"Militants descended on a village and barged into the houses of the minority community and opened fire. Five people died and four were injured," a police official said in Jammu, the winter capital of Jammu and Kashmir, India's only Muslim-majority state.

Security forces had been rushed to the village.

The killings came a day after two children were killed in an attack by militants who hurled grenades and fired on a group of Hindu pilgrims in the region's Doda district.

Police said on Sunday three civilians including two village defense committee members were killed by unidentified militants in the same area. No militant group has claimed responsibility.

Four members of the pro-Pakistan Hizb-ul-Mujahideen militant group and a civilian were killed in a fierce gunbattle in Budgam district, west of Srinagar, the summer capital of the state, police said. Two soldiers were also wounded in the fight.

In another incident, a police officer was killed and three policemen were injured when separatist guerrillas attacked a police patrol in Pulwama district in south Kashmir.

Hizb-ul-Mujahideen claimed responsibility for the attack.

"A group of Hizbul militants attacked SOG (Special Operations Group) in Pulwama and inflicted heavy casualty," Salim Hashmi, spokesman of Hizb-ul-Mujahideen, told Reuters. SOG is the counter-insurgency arm of the Jammu and Kashmir Police.

Five militants, a civilian and a paramilitary soldier were killed in other shootouts across the region.

Nearly 12 militant groups are battling Indian rule in the state where a rebellion that erupted some 12 years ago has claimed over 33,000 lives.

India accuses Pakistan of stoking the revolt in Kashmir by sending militants across a ceasefire line dividing the region.

Pakistan denies the charge, saying it provides only moral and diplomatic support to what it calls a struggle for self-determination.

New Delhi says the military standoff, in which the two armies have massed a million troops along their border, will end after Pakistan stops infiltration of militants into Indian Kashmir.

06/16/02 11:08 ET