KL NEWS NETWORK
SRINAGAR
Six suspected militants died in day-long gun-battles with forces in Lolab and Drugmulla areas of north Kashmir’s Kupwara district, reports said.
Reports said acting on a tip-off about presence of some militants in the forest area of Doben Khurhama—the last habitation of the area which is 35 km away from Kupwara—the army’s 18 RR cordoned off the forests this morning. Soon, they said, the forces intensified the cordon and search operation and sealed off all the exit points for the suspected militants.
After suspected militants opened fire, forces engaged them in the gunfight which finally ended in the afternoon, resulting in killing of three unidentified militants, a newspaper report said.
“Bodies of all the three militants have been recovered,” a Kupwara-based army officer said.
A Srinagar-based army spokesperson confirmed the killing of three militants and said search operation in the area is on.
The slain militants were laid to rest at Doben village in Khurhama by residents this afternoon when the bodies were handed over to them by police following medico-legal formalities.
“We had to travel six kms from Khurma to Doben on foot to reach the encounter site and conduct the post-mortem of slain militants,” a doctor who was part of the post mortem team was quoted as having said.
Meanwhile, in another encounter which broke out at around 4:30 pm at Waterkhani village of Drugmulla—some five km away from Kupwara near Kupwara- Srinagar road—three militants were killed, a senior police officer told a newspaper late Thursday night.
The police official said after a joint team of 47 RR and local SOG cordoned the forest area in Waterkhani, exchange of firing started between the two sides. “Three militants were killed in this encounter,” he said.
