Police: 2 officers killed by rebels in Indian-held Kashmir
SRINAGAR, India (AP) — Anti-India rebels in Indian-controlled Kashmir attacked a police party in the disputed region’s main city Friday, killing two officers and injuring another, police said.
Inspector-General Vijay Kumar said militants sprayed bullets at the police from a narrow lane on a busy highway in Srinagar amid heightened security to counter any possible rebel attacks on the eve of India’s independence day on Saturday.
Reinforcements of counterinsurgency police and soldiers were searching the area for the attackers.
None of the rebel groups that have been fighting against Indian rule since 1989 immediately claimed responsibility for the attack.
Kumar said police have identified the attackers and would soon "neutralize” them.
The attack comes amid near-daily fighting between Pakistani and Indian soldiers along the highly militarized frontier that divides Kashmir between the two nuclear-armed rivals.
India and Pakistan each claim the divided territory of Kashmir in its entirety. Many Muslim Kashmiris support the rebel goal that the territory be united either under Pakistani rule or as an independent country.
India accuses Pakistan of arming and training the rebels, a charge Pakistan denies.
Tens of thousands of civilians, rebels and government forces have been killed in the conflict.
