15 wounded in Kashmir protests over militants’ death sentences

SRINAGAR - At least 15 people, including eight policemen, were injured Friday in violence during a strike called by the separatist Hurriyat Conference in the Kashmir Valley to protest the death sentences of two Kashmiris for the 1996 Lajpat Nagar blast.

Violence erupted in parts of Srinagar city early Friday after mobs shouting anti-India slogans took to the streets in several localities even though the entire old city was placed under an undeclared curfew by the administration.

Heavy deployment of police and paramilitary Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) was made in the old city area and pedestrian and vehicular movement was curbed.

A posse of CRPF men opened fire on a group of people leaving a mosque in the Nowshehra area here in the afternoon, triggering tension.

A senior police officer said 49-year-old Manzoor Ahmad received a bullet injury in his abdomen and was operated upon by doctors at the institute of medical sciences.

Police also resorted to tear smoke and baton charges to disperse stone-throwing mobs in other parts of the capital city. The clashes continued till late in the evening.

The security forces had a tough time dealing with the stone-pelting mobs in the city.

Reports from north Kashmir’s Baramulla and Sopore towns said police used tear smoke and batons to disperse the stone pelters.

Police also used batons in south Kashmir’s Anantnag town to chase mobs pelting stones and shouting slogans.

The pro-independence Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF) chairman Muhammad Yasin Malik was detained by the police while leading protests against the death sentence of two locals and life imprisonment for another local by a Delhi court.