SRINAGAR, 24 July 2005 — Fighting between Indian security forces and suspected rebels left seven dead in Kashmir yesterday, as soldiers raided a village and continued a gunbattle with infiltrators, officials said. The pre-dawn raid by soldiers on the village of Ajar triggered a gunbattle in which one suspected insurgent and three soldiers were killed, a local police officer said on customary condition of anonymity.
Ajar is about 75 kilometers north of Srinagar, the summer capital of India’s Jammu-Kashmir state. On the border, three suspected intruders were killed on the 11th day of a running gunbattle with Indian forces.
Fifteen of about 35 militants who sneaked into Indian territory through a remote, snowbound mountain pass in the region known as Kabuli Gali on July 13 have been killed, said army spokesman Lt. Col. V.K. Batra.
Meanwhile, New Delhi will soon set dates for fresh talks with moderate separatists in Kashmir on the disputed region’s future, Indian Junior Home Minister Sriprakash Jaiswal said yesterday.
“We’ll soon fix dates for talks with the Hurriyat Conference,” Jaiswal said, referring to the mainly Muslim region’s separatist alliance, the All-Parties Hurriyat Conference which is split between moderates and hard-liners.
“The government is ready to hold talks. Our doors are open for anybody and everybody who wants peace and normalcy to return to Kashmir,” Jaiswal told a news conference in Srinagar.
The move to renew dialogue follows the return of moderate separatist leaders from a groundbreaking trip to Pakistan in June where they held their first-ever talks with Pakistani leaders over the region’s future.
The trip was part of a wider peace process between India and Pakistan.
Moderate separatists held two rounds of talks last year with India’s previous government led by the Hindu-fundamentalist Bharatiya Janata Party but had sought permission to travel to Pakistan before resuming discussions.
After their return from Pakistan, the moderate separatists said they were ready to re-open the stalled dialogue with the Congress government which took power in May last year. But they said it was up to New Delhi to decide the timing.
Jaiswal, however, said the moderates should convey their willingness to hold talks through “proper channels” rather than public statements. He did not elaborate about the nature of the proper channels.
Hard-line separatist politicians who have the backing of the rebels have branded talks with New Delhi “meaningless” and “a disservice to the cause” of Kashmiris.
The hard-liners want tripartite talks involving India, Pakistan and the “true representatives” of Kashmiris or implementation of decades-old UN Security Council resolutions calling for a plebiscite in the region on its future.
India calls the UN resolutions obsolete and says the dispute over Kashmir must be resolved bilaterally with Pakistan.
Meanwhile, Jaiswal said despite a recent spurt in rebel violence, the 19-month-old peace process between India and Pakistan was advancing.
On Tuesday, four troops and a civilian were killed and 21 others injured by a car bomb in Srinagar, the latest in a string of deadly blasts.
“The rise in militant attacks is the manifestation of their desperation,” he said. “They don’t want peace to return but despite that the peace process is moving forward.” The insurgency has left more than 44,000 people dead by official count. Separatists say the toll is at least twice as high.
