Kashmir: Police Kill Militant Group Commander and Deputy in Srinagar
New Delhi: The top commander of a militant group and his deputy, allegedly involved in dozens of target killings, died in a shootout, Jammu and Kashmir police said on Monday. Abbas Sheikh, chief of the militant group The Resistance Front (TRF), and Saqib Manzoor were killed during a shootout in Srinagar, Vijay Kumar, the police chief of Kashmir, told Reuters.
Kumar said the militants were involved in dozens of target killings, including the murders of Babar Qadri, a prominent lawyer, and a few workers of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). The TRF is an offshoot of Pakistan-based militant group Lashkar-e-Tayyaba, Kumar said. India and neighbouring Pakistan have disputed Kashmir since the end of British colonial rule in 1947. Both countries claim it in full but actually rule it in part.
More than 50,000 people have been killed in more than three decades of insurgency in Kashmir that India accuses Pakistan of fomenting, by supporting Muslim militant groups fighting India's security forces in its part of the divided region. Pakistan says, it only offers political support to its fellow Muslims in the Himalayan region.
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