SRINAGAR: Separatists struck in north Kashmir’s Sopore town on Friday, killing a policeman and a civilian and wounding six others.
A senior police officer said here that armed men hurled a powerful hand grenade at the heavily guarded Sopore police station building in the morning. “The grenade hit the roof of the police station building then exploded at the entrance after rolling down. One political activist of the Congress party was injured in the explosion,” the officer said.
As the area superintendent of police reached the explosion site with reinforcements, the armed men opened heavy automatic gunfire. “Four policemen were injured in the gunfire. Three other civilians were also wounded in the firing,” the officer said.
The injured were taken to the Sopore hospital where attending doctors referred the four injured policemen and three civilians who had sustained serious bullet wounds for specialized treatment to Srinagar.
No group claimed responsibility for the attack.
In the eastern state of Bihar meanwhile the government deployed additional forces to guard energy facilities including an oil refinery after police found maps of such units with a suspected militant from Bangladesh.
“We are investigating how he managed to get maps of key oil installations,” Nayyar Hasnain Khan, a senior police officer, said on Friday. The suspected militant was arrested Wednesday, police said.
State-run Indian Oil Corp has 14 key oil facilities in Bihar, including a 120,000 barrels per day refinery at Barauni, depots and plants to fill cooking gas in cylinders.
The move comes weeks after intelligence agencies said militants may target oil refineries and nuclear facilities. “We have been informed that oil refineries and other key government installations could be targets,” Vinay Kumar, a senior police officer in the district where the Barauni refinery is located, told Reuters.
— With input from agencies
