India Condemns Kashmir Raid as Toll Rises

14/07/2002| IslamWeb

India Sunday condemned a raid in Kashmir by gunmen, some dressed as Hindu holy men, who killed 27 slum dwellers and the government said it would give its response Monday.After an emergency cabinet meeting, India sent Deputy Prime Minister Lal Krishna Advani to the scene of the worst attack in disputed Kashmir since a May raid on an India army camp that left 34 people dead and stoked war fears between India and Pakistan. (Read photo caption)

Witnesses said about five men, some of whom were dressed in the saffron robes of Hindu holy men, struck as many people listened to a broadcast Saturday of an India-England cricket match in a mainly Hindu slum in Jammu, winter capital of Jammu and Kashmir state, killing 24 people on the spot.

Three others later died from their wounds, police said. The dead included 13 women and a child. Another 28 people remained in hospital, eight of them critically wounded.

The attack threatened to stoke tension between nuclear-capable foes India and Pakistan and comes ahead of a planned late-July visit to the region by Secretary of State Colin Powell.

The United States has been leading international efforts to calm tensions between India and Pakistan, which have fought two of their three wars over Kashmir since both became independent from Britain in 1947.

PAKISTAN CONDEMNS RAID

"All this is happening with the inspiration of Pakistan," foreign minister Yashwant Sinha told the Aaj Tak television news channel Sunday before the meeting of the cabinet's security committee led by Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee.

Pakistan, which has pledged to stop militants crossing into Indian Kashmir, condemned the killings and said the attack was aimed at destabilizing South Asia.

"The government of Pakistan condemns the killing of a number of civilians and injuries to many others in a terrorist attack on the outskirts of Jammu," a Foreign Ministry statement said Sunday.

GRENADES AND GUNFIRE

Survivors said the attackers struck in the middle of a power blackout, throwing grenades and spraying the area with bullets.
No-one has claimed responsibility for the raid.

Police said they suspected Pakistan-based Lashkar-e-Taiba, also blamed for the December attack on India's parliament that triggered the latest military standoff between India and Pakistan and raised fears of war.

ELECTIONS LOOM

About a dozen armed Kashmiri nationalist groups are fighting Indian rule in Jammu and Kashmir.
Analysts had warned another major attack in Kashmir could force India to strike against the nationalists across the frontier.
But Kanti Bajpai, defense analyst at New Delhi's Jawaharlal Nehru University said he expected a restrained response ahead of state elections in October.

PHOTO CAPTION

Relatives mourn for their dead killed in Saturday's militant attack in Qasimnagar before a funeral in Jammu, India, Sunday, July 14, 2002. Suspected Islamic militants killed at least 25 Hindus in the deadliest attack in the disputed state of Jammu and Kashmir. (AP Photo/Manish Swarup)
- Jul 14 8:38 AM ET