Four killed, dozens injured in Kashmir clashes

earthtimes.org

13 08 2010

Srinagar, Kashmir – Four people were killed and more than a dozen people injured Friday as protestors defying a curfew clashed with security forces in India-administered Kashmir, police said.

Mudasir Ahmad Zargar, 21, was killed in Kupwara district while three others – Muhammad Arif Mir, 19, Sumeer Ahmad Lone, 18, and Ali Muhammad Khandey, 60, died in Baramullah district, according to police.

Most of the deaths took place when security forces fired at mobs that attacked a paramilitary police camp in Sopore town in Baramullah district and threw stones at security forces in Pattan, also in Baramullah, and in Tregham village in Kupwara.

Several women were among those injured in Tregham.

The death toll in violent street protests in Kashmir over thepast two months has reached 56. More than half the victims were young people including a 9-year-old child.

Several other towns, including Jammu and Kashmir state capital Srinagar and Shopian saw protestors out on the streets defying a curfew order and clashing with security forces.

The violent street protests that have rocked the disputed Kashmir region since late May showed no signs of abating with separatist leaders issuing calls to defy the curfew and hold protest marches.

The Muslim-majority Kashmir valley has seen a security clampdown in response to the protests.

Strong anti-India sentiment in the area often pits protestors against security forces, who are present in large numbers to control a violent secessionist movement which peaked in the late 1980s.

India has accused neighbouring Pakistan of aiding Kashmiri militants, a charge Islamabad has denied, calling them freedom fighters

Stone-pelting mob clashes with police

Express news service

Sat Aug 14 2010

Half a dozen people including policemen were injured as police fired teargas shells and a fired warning shots in the air to disperse an unruly mob pelting stones in the town on Friday afternoon.

Sources said that trouble erupted when a group of people, soon after Friday prayers, went to the bazaar to make people pull down their shutters to express solidarity with the people of Kashmir. However, on not getting the desired response as they were too few people, they returned to the mosque to ask more people to join them.

After some time, when they again tried to go to the bazaar to force closure of shops, they were stopped by a contingent of police headed by Station House Officer of Banihal Police Station, Sajjad Ahmed Mir. As the mob resisted and started pelting stones, police lobbed teargas shells and fired warning shots to disperse them.

Firing by government forces kills 1 anti-India protester in Kashmir

CP

13 08 2010

SRINAGAR, India — Government forces fired at hundreds of anti-India protesters for defying a curfew in the Indian portion of Kashmir on Friday, killing a teenage student and injuring at least six others, police said.

The violence was the latest in two-month stretch of civil unrest that has left at least 52 people dead. Most of the victims have been shot by government forces in their clashes with rock-throwing demonstrators during protests against India’s rule over the predominantly Muslim Himalayan territory.

Friday’s firing occurred after the protesters threw stones at government forces, angered by their refusal to allow them to visit a village mosque for morning prayers on the first Friday after the start of the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan, resident Maqsood Ahmed said.

A teenage student was killed and at least six others wounded in the firing by government forces in Trehgam, a village north of Indian Kashmir’s main city Srinagar, a police officer said on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk to reporters.

The protesters were later joined by thousands of residents from neighbouring villages, leading to more clashes with government forces, officer said.

The situation in the volatile disputed region in recent week has been reminiscent of the late 1980s, when protests against New Delhi’s rule sparked an armed conflict that has so far killed more than 68,000 people, mostly civilians.

Anti-India sentiment runs deep in mostly Muslim Kashmir, divided between India and Pakistan but claimed by both in entirety. Separatists reject Indian sovereignty over Kashmir and want to form a separate country or merge with predominantly Muslim Pakistan.

On Friday, authorities did not impose a curfew in Srinagar after a key separatist leader and cleric, Mirwaiz Umar Farooq, warned of a total defiance if worshippers were stopped from praying at the Jamia Masjid, the main mosque in the city.

The mosque has remained out of bound for people on Fridays for the past six weeks to avoid protests after the prayers.

« Government is now even interfering in our religious affairs and not allowing us to offer prayers at the Jamia Masjid. If this situation continues it is binding on Muslim clerics to call for a war on the state, » warned Farooq.

Meanwhile, shops, businesses and most government offices were closed in Srinagar on Friday and public transport stayed off the roads.

Fresh clashes erupts, people March towards Jamia in Srinagar

kashmirwatch.com

13 08 2010

Wasim Khan

Srinagar, Aug 13 (AIP): The restrictions and curfew which continuously in force in Srinagar and other towns of Kashmir for the past two months have been lifted in Srinagar city today morning.

As the news about lifting of the restrictions and curfew spread in the city, thousands of people started coming out of their homes and March towards the grand mosque of Srinagar Jamia Masjid. Forces have been withdrawn from several localities.

Announcements are being made from local mosque loudspeakers for people to come out of their homes and march towards Jamia Masjid.

In some localities, there are reports that Forces were again deployed. However, gun shots were also heard in Rainawari area of the city.

Shops, educational institutions, banks, post offices and other businesses remained shutting in Srinagar and other major towns of the Valley and public transport remained off the roads.

Reports of clashes between stone pelting mobs and security forces have also come in from north Kashmir Baramulla town, Palhalan village and Pattan town.

At all these places, mobs defied curfew to engage the security forces in clashes.

Meanwhile, two persons – man and a teenage girl have been injured when paramilitary forces opened fire on Friday while enforcing curfew in north Kashmir’s Pattan area of Baramulla district.

Locals and eyewitnesses said that, paramilitary forces opened meaningless firing on people in Pattan town resulting in injuries to at least two persons, one of whom critically.

One of the injured, identified as 60-year-old Ali Mohammad Khanday, has received a serious wound in his head and another teenage girl has got a gunshot in her leg.

Meanwhile, demonstrations were held in Baramulla town since morning as paramilitary and police forces started enforcing curfew.

The Kashmir Valley has been on the boil for two months due to violent protests against civilians being killed in firing by security forces.

~ par Alain Bertho sur 13 août 2010.

Publié dans émeutes, riots