SRINAGAR, India, 29 November 2006 — At least seven tourists and three Kashmiris were injured yesterday when militants threw a hand grenade into a bus. The attack took place at Tangmarg health resort, 40 km from Srinagar, at the start of the winter tourist season.
Police said a group of tourists from the southern state of Kerala, who were returning after visiting Gulmarg, had stopped for a cup of tea at a roadside stall when militants threw the grenade inside their bus.
The injured were brought to Srinagar and admitted to hospitals after initial for treatment by doctors in Tangmarg.
At least 15 tourists have been killed and 55 wounded this year in a series of attacks on visitors to the scenic Himalayan region. The tourist industry has borne the brunt of the separatist violence in the past 18 years.
Elsewhere, a top militant leader and an army officer were killed in a fierce predawn gunbattle. Sohail Faisal, a top commander of the Hizbul Mujahedeen, was killed in the firefight in Bijbehara, said Hemant Lohia, deputy inspector general of police in Srinagar.
Faisal was responsible for planning and executing some of the deadliest car bomb attacks carried out by the Hizb in the state over the past three years, Lohia said.
Police launched an operation in Bijbehara, a small town 50 km south of Srinagar, after a tip that Faisal was there. An intense gunfight broke out after he was challenged, he said.
