SRINAGAR, Indian-ruled Kashmir (Islamweb & News Agencies) - Islamic Resistance men killed five Indian soldiers and wounded another 10 people, including five civilians, in two separate land mine explosions in the troubled Jammu-Kashmir state Sunday, police said.
A powerful land mine blast ripped through two army vehicles near Angralla, 185 miles south of Srinagar, the state's summer capital. One of the vehicles fell into a gorge, killing five soldiers and seriously injuring one, police said.
In Srinagar, a land mine blew up near a residential neighborhood. Four soldiers patrolling the area and five residents were wounded, an official said, speaking on customary condition of anonymity.
Also on Sunday, police said they killed six Resistance men in separate shootouts in different parts of the state. Three security men were also killed in the clashes.
The Pakistan-based Hezb-ul Mujahedeen group claimed responsibility for the attack near Angralla.
Saleem Hashmi, the group's spokesman, claimed the blast had killed nine soldiers.
Hashmi's organization is among more than a dozen Resistance groups in the northern Indian state. The Resistance are fighting for an independent Kashmir or for the predominantly Muslim region to join Islamic Pakistan, India's western neighbor.
Human rights estimate 60,000 people have been killed since the insurgency erupted 12 years ago.
PHOTO CAPTION:
An Indian paramilitary soldier stands guard outside a shopping complex after it was damaged in an Improvised Explosive Device (IED) blast in the outskirts of Srinagar, in Indian-ruled Kashmir, Sunday, Sept. 9, 2001. An IED, planted in a bicycle by suspected Kashmiri Resistance men, exploded when an Indian paramilitary vehicle passed in front of a shopping complex. At least ten people were injured in the explosion, two of them seriously including five soldiers and five civilians. (AP Photo/Aijaz Rahi)
- Sep 09 10:55 AM ET