Indian troops launch search operation in IHK

Army helicopters hover over large area;
people protest, hurl stones at occupation forces;
senior cop says impossible to capture militants

HELD SRINAGAR: Thousands of soldiers and paramilitaries were on Thursday engaged in a huge anti-militant operation in the Indian Held Kashmir (IHK), where armed militants had repeatedly attacked government forces in recent weeks.

Police said government forces had surrounded at least 20 villages in the drive, launched early Thursday in Shopian district in the volatile south of the disputed Himalayan region. "It is an unprecedented operation," Deputy Inspector General of Police S P Pani said. He said, "It is impossible to capture the militants, but we hope there will be contact (exchange of fire) with them in the course of the day."

Suspected militants are frequently killed in shoot-outs with government forces in occupied Kashmir, but are only rarely captured alive. The witnesses said that hundreds of residents came out onto the streets in two villages, Sug and Tarkwangan, during the search operations and threw stones at the soldiers. They said army helicopters were hovering above the area as the search operations were going on.

A civilian driver was killed and two soldiers were injured after a private vehicle hired by the army to transport troops came under fire, a senior police officer said late Thursday. "The civilian driver of the vehicle was injured and later died. Two other soldiers in the vehicle also received bullet injuries," the police officer said.

One said soldiers had attacked private homes in his village with sticks and rocks. "It was scary. Many houses were damaged," the villager told by phone, requesting anonymity. The mujahideen groups have fought for decades against the roughly 500,000 Indian soldiers deployed in the Himalayan territory, demanding independence or a merger of the entire territory with Pakistan.Officials say the militants' ranks have swelled since July, when the killing of a popular leader by security forces sparked widespread unrest that left at least 100 civilians dead. Since then armed encounters between militants and government forces have been more frequent.

The latest operation comes after five policemen were shot dead this week in a raid on a bank van carrying cash -- the latest in a series of bank robberies in the region carried out by suspected militants.

Last week militants killed three soldiers in a predawn assault on a garrison near the border known as the Line of Control that divides Kashmir between India and Pakistan. The Kashmir Valley has been tense since early April, when election day violence kicked off a series of anti-India protests including by students.

Popular support for the militants has also risen and villagers now regularly come out onto the streets during operations to throw stones at government forces.