Police identifies two Hizb militants as ‘killers’ in Sopore; reward of Rs 20 lakh for their arrest

 

Ahmed Ali Fayyaz

________

SRINAGAR, Jun 16: In a significant development, Police on Tuesday identified two top militants of Hizbul Mujahideen as the ‘killers’ of six civilians in a chain of terror attacks in Sopore. It announced cash reward of Rs 20 lakh for their arrest even as a Police officer’s Personal Security Officer was shot dead by unidentified gunmen outside the Police Station in Bijbehara township of South Kashmir.

At several places in the much terrorised township of Sopore, Police pasted posters carrying sketches of the top wanted Hizbul Mujahideen militants Abdul Qayoom Najar and Imtiyaz Ahmad Kandoo, holding them responsible for the back-to-back killing of six civilians in less than a month. It announced cash reward of Rs 10 lakh for each militant’s arrest. Facing flak for a series of terror attacks that left six people dead in the last around three weeks in Sopore, Mufti Mohammad Sayeed’s government finally announced the sizable cash reward for anybody who would help the Police in arresting the duo.

Hours after the posters came up in Sopore, suspected guerrillas fired a rifle grenade in Muslim Peer locality late on Tuesday night. Preliminary reports said that it did not cause any damage. IGP Kashmir Javaid Mujtaba Gillani told State Times that the residents of Muslim Peer heard an explosion late on Tuesday night. A Police party rushed to the spot for an inspection of the site.

IGP said that an unidentified person fired pistol shots on Constable Arif Ahmad, the PSO of SHO Bijbehara, outside Police Station Bijbehara, killing him on the spot. “Yes, a Constable has died in the attack and we are just ascertaining the facts”, IGP said.

The cash reward posters appeared in Sopore ahead of a shutdown called by both factions of the Hurriyat Conference, JKLF chairman Yasin Malik and Shabir Ahmad Shah of Democratic Freedom Party. The separatists have held the government agencies responsible for the killing of the six civilians and called for a Valley-wide protest shutdown on Wednesday, to be followed up by a mass march from Srinagar to Sopore on Friday.

In reaction to the Police announcement, Pakistan-based militant amalgam United Jihad Council rejected the government’s allegation against the two Hizb militants. Its spokesman Sadaqat Hussain said in a statement that the militant conglomerate would carry out its independent investigation as, according to him, Police carried no credibility. According to him, successors of Kukka Parray were still existing in J&K Police. He asserted that UJC would identify the killers of the six civilians and give him suitable punishment.

In a related development, Lashkar-e-Tayyiba supported the Kashmiri separatists’ call for shutdown on Wednesday and a march to Sopore on Friday.

END

Separatists unite on 6th killing, call for shutdown, mass march to Sopore

Ahmed Ali Fayyaz

SRINAGAR, June 15: With the Jammu and Kashmir Police and security forces being continuously mute spectators to the resurgence of terrorism in Sopore after several years of peace, unidentified gunmen on Monday shot dead yet another civilian---sixth in a row in less than a month.

According to the official sources, an unidentified gunman shot dead 38-year-old Aijaz Ahmad Rishi close to his residence at Mundji in Sopore at 8.00 a.m. Once a militant of Harkatul Mujahideen, Rishi had not joined any militant organisation after his release from jail. He was the sixth civilian killed in target fire in less than one month in Sopore.

Significantly for the first time after Hurriyat Conference's split in 2003, representatives of both the factions of the separatist conglomerate, alongwith some leaders of JKLF, held a meeting at Jamia Masjid in downtown Srinagar to discuss the unidentified assassins' killing spree in Sopore. They jointly called for a total protest shutdown in the Valley on June 17th besides a mass march from Srinagar to Sopore on June 19th, Friday. The participants attributed all the six killings to the Union Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar's revelation.

In May, Parrikar had said that India would use terrorists to neutralize the terrorists, raising an alarm in the Valley’s separatist camp.

Senior separatist leader and head of Democratic Freedom Party Shabir Ahmad Shah issued a separate statement, calling for shutdown on Wednesday and march to Sopore on Friday.

In their separate statements, heads of the formidable guerrilla outfits Hizbul Mujahideen and Lashkar-e-Tayyiba held the Central secret agencies responsible for the current spell of terror in Sopore. They vowed to strike back on the "India-sponsored gunmen, claiming that the assassins would meet the fate of once the dreaded militants-turned-counterinsurgents Kukka Parray and Javed Shah.

Meanwhile, JKLF Chairman Yasin Malik on Monday visited Sopore and held a protest sit-in. He interacted with the residents. Malik alleged that the Indian Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar was responsible for the fresh spell of terror that began in Sopore with a diktat to the mobile phone operators last month. Six persons, including two associated with the mobile telephony, were shot dead in different incidents of shootout in less than a month.

Mufti Sayeed-led PDP-BJP government has watched the six killings helplessly, making it a point to ignore even a routine statement on the same in its daily handouts. No changes have been affected in Police despite near-total system failure in Sopore.

An official spokesperson said in a press release on Monday that Chief Minister Mufti Mohammad Sayeed had taken a serious view of the killings of the civilians in Sopore and issued directions to the Home Department for stepping up investigations and providing secure environment to all civilians.

"The matter is also scheduled to be discussed in the meeting of the Unified Headquarters, which has been convened on June 17th", said the handout from the government. He said that the Police had taken all possible steps to fast-track investigation into all the relevant aspects of the incidents", the spokesperson said. It added that a special monitoring mechanism had been employed "to keep track of proper investigation". He asserted that the State Government was making all out efforts to ensure the safety and security of the innocent civilians.

END

On 5th assassination in Sopore, Geelani wants Mufti to act

Ahmed Ali Fayyaz
--------------------------

SRINAGAR, June 14: With the fifth civilian assassination in a row in Sopore in less than a month, separatist hardliner Syed Ali Shah Geelani on Sunday said that Chief Minister Mufti Mohammad Sayeed had forfeited his right to rule in Jammu and Kashmir.

According to official sources, an unidentified gunman shot dead one-time JKLF militant Merajuddin Dar, who had been running a wholesale poultry business in his Badami Bagh neighbourhood after his release from jail in 1993, close to his residence and shop at 9.00 a.m. Residents and family members rushed him to Sub District Hospital of Sopore where doctors declared him as 'brought dead'.

Carried out in broad daylight in a militant-infested locality, the fifth assassination of its kind in Sopore in less than a month spread a fresh wave of terror. The apple town of Sopore was already observing shutdown to protest an identical killing of a Geelani loyalist Khursheed Ahmad Bhat of Bumai when the news of Merajuddin Dar broke in the forenoon. Like the last five killings, no guerrilla outfit claimed responsibility for Dar's assassination.

Current killing spree by unidentified gunmen commenced last month after an unknown guerrilla group 'Lashkar-e-Islam' asked for total closedown of mobile telephony through posters in Sopore. It threatened to eliminate anyone daring to defy the diktat. As the seven day deadline passed, a chain of firing and grenades started. Of the five civilians killed till date, two were associated with the mobile telephony, two more were Geelani’s separatist followers and one was a militant-turned-trader.

Geelani has labeled the assassinations as "the handiwork of the Indian secret agencies" even as many people in Sopore insist that counter-insurgents could not operate freely in a separatist hub like Sopore. A section of the population has alleged that the assassins of Sopore were "government sponsored counter-terrorists".

While expressing his deep grief and shock over another civilian killing (Mehraj-ud-din Dar) in Sopore, Geelani said the civilian killings "by the government gunmen" had taken an ugly turn. He said that the Hurriyat Conference, after holding detailed deliberations over this issue, would inform general public about how to deal with this serious situation. Geelani said in a statement that the common people were being "brutally killed" in broad daylight and the government was "watching as a mute spectator". He alleged there was "no moral justification for him to remain in power".

"If he will not do that, then the people will be right to understand that the Indian secret agencies have got full support of the Mufti Sayed government for the bloodshed of the common Kashmiris and that he was playing the role of a facilitator in implementing this plot", Geelani said.

END

Another Hurriyat (G) activist shot dead in Sopore

Ahmed Ali Fayyaz

SRINAGAR, June 12: In the second consecutive strike on the separatist hardliner Syed Ali Shah Geelani's associates in his home constituency of Sopore, unidentified assassins shot dead a young shopkeeper on Friday night.

Official sources, quoting eyewitness accounts, told State Times that two unidentified persons appeared at Bomai, 12 km from Sopore, and shot dead 28-year-old Khursheed Ahmad Bhat son of Ghulam Nabi Bhat, in close vicinity of his home st 8.00 pm. Residents and family members rushed him to hospital where doctors declared him 'brought dead'. According to the doctors, three pistol shots had been pumped into Bhat’s head.

Residents said that Bhat was a known activist of Geelani-led faction of the Hurriyat Conference. Significantly, on Tuesday last, unidentified gunmen had shot dead prominent Hurriyat (Geelani) activist Sheikh Altaf-ur-Rehman close to his residence in Sopore town in broad daylight.

Geelani, as also Hizbul Mujahideen supremo and United Jihad Council chief Syed Salahuddin, had strongly condemned Sheikh's killing and held "Indian secret agencies" responsible for his assassination. Hizb chief even threatened to punish Sheikh’s killers. Geelani called for a protest shutdown in Baramulla district on Wednesday and asked the Kashmiris all over the valley to hold funeral prayers on Friday for the slain separatist activist who had served several terms of detention under Public Safety Act and functioned as a member of the Executive Committee of Geelani's Tehreek-e-Hurriyat. Sheikh’s father, a former militant of Hizbul Mujahideen, is currently Sopore zonal head of Jamaat-e-Islami.

Remarkably, Sheikh’s assassination was the first killing of an anti-India and pro-Pakistan activist in Sopore area in the last several years. All other civilians killed in similar incident of target fire by unidentified gunmen carried the tag of anti - Pakistan and pro-India. Bhat’s killing on Friday comes as the second assassination of its kind. Previously, unidentified gunmen, claiming to be the cadres of a new guerrilla group "Lashkar-e-Islam", carried out several attacks on the civilians who defied the outfit’s diktat of closing down mobile phone networking towers and recharge outlets. Two civilians were killed and five more left injured in these terror attacks.

Meanwhile, during a protest against Sheikh’s killing on Geelani’s call on Friday, masked men waved two Pakistani and one ISIS flag at Jamia Masjid in downtown Srinagar which is the religious seat of Mirwaiz Umar Farooq, the head of another faction of Hurriyat Conference.

END

DGP, Geelani threaten to ‘expose’ Sopore terrorists

Ahmed Ali Fayyaz

___________

SRINAGAR, Jun 11: Notwithstanding the senior separatist leader Syed Ali Shah Geelani’s claim that none other than the “Indian secret agencies” were behind the burgeoning terrorism, Director General of Police K. Rajendra Kumar is going to claim that all the recent acts of harassment and bloodletting were the handiwork of Hizbul Mujahideen’s Sopore unit.

While touring the North Kashmir townships of Sopore, Baramulla, Handwara and Kupwara, DGP on Thursday told mediapersons that the Police had got “vital leads” on the identity and activities of the armed group that had spread a wave of terror with guerrilla attacks and civilian killings in Sopore area in the last two weeks. “Within the period of two days, Police will make the facts public before press. We have restored the communication system and arrested some saboteurs. If at any place, a mobile tower owner or any other outlet feels any threat, police will immediately provide security cover to that place or a person. We will ensure that there’s no telecommunication breakdown in Kashmir.”

In the last three weeks, unidentified guerrillas operating under the banner of “Lashkar-e-Islam” have asked the vendors---retailers as well as franchises--- in Sopore and other North Kashmir towns to freeze all telecommunication signals and recharge of mobile telephones. They set the deadline of seven days and immediately thereafter unleashed a reign of terror on the defaulters. While as two persons associated with the mobile telephony were shot dead, at least five others sustained injuries in these attacks.

Subsequently, the unidentified gunmen shot dead a senior Jamaat-e-Islami and Tehreek-e-Hurriyat activist in Sopore township.

According to the highly placed sources in J&K Police Headquarters, DGP would hold a press conference on Saturday or Sunday and directly blame the local Hizbul Mujahideen cadres of Sopore for causing harassment to the mobile service vendors. He would claim that all the three civilians in Sopore area had been killed by Hizbul Mujahideen.

Sources revealed that DGP could name the Hizb militants like the dreaded Qayoom Najjar, Imtiyaz Kandoo, Naveed, Muz Maulvi, Meraj Halwai, Tariq of Handwara and two more from Palhalan and hold them responsible for the recent acts of terror. He would claim that the Jamaat activist Sheikh Altaf-ur-Rehman had been shot dead by a Sopore-based militant of Hizbul Mujhaideen Imtiyaz Kandoo.

However, Geelani has held the “Indian secret agencies” responsible for the chain of harassment and fatal attacks. On Wednesday, Geelani said in a statement that the Indian secret agencies were trying to create confusion among the separatists with sinister machinations in social media: “They are not hidden from us and if their poisonous thinking becomes the reason for any other killing, we will be left with no other option to expose them”.

In another statement on Thursday, Geelani said: “Whether it is the figures of the sacrifices or the matter of the election boycott, Sopore has set an example and it has become a role model for the freedom lovers. Sopore area has always been the matter of concern for the policymakers of India so, this time they have hatched a deep conspiracy against this region and they want to terrorise the people with the fake organizations and want to spread anarchy here”.

Geelani asserted that organisations like Taliban and ISIS did not exist in Sopore or any other part of Kashmir and alleged that the government agencies were circulating fake threat posters and harassing the mobile telephone and cable TV operators only to defame the Kashmiris’ “freedom struggle”.

END

Jamaat-Hurriyat functionary gunned down in Sopore

Ahmed Ali Fayyaz

______

SRINAGAR, Jun 9: A prominent separatist activist, who belonged to a Jamaat-e-Islami family and held a position in Syed Ali Shah Geelani-led Tehreek-e-Hurriyat, was shot dead by unidentified gunmen in Kashmir valley’s hub of the militancy in Sopore on Tuesday.

Informed sources told State Times that in the afternoon, when 45-year-old Sheikh Altaf-ur-Rehman of Iqbal Nagar, Sopore, was returning from Sub District Hospital (SDH) Sopore, he was ambushed by unidentified gunmen on Noorbagh Road. He was critically hit in his head and chest. Residents rushed him to the nearby SDH where doctors declared him “brought dead”. He seemed to have died on the spot.

Deputy Inspector General of Police in North Kashmir, Gareeb Das told State Times that Police Station of Sopore registered a murder case and started the investigation even as Sheikh’s funeral rites were conducted amid pro-Azadi slogans. He said that around 800 people participated in the Namaaz-e-Janazah. DIG said that five 9 mm shots had been fired upon Sheikh but it was not immediately clear whether the assassins used an automatic pistol or a higher calibre gun. He said that 9 mm rounds could be fired from different makes of the weapons.

It is four years after the Jamiat-e-Ahl-e-Hadith chief Maulana Showkat’s assassination in an IED blast in Maisuma area of Srinagar that a prominent separatist activist has been eliminated in a guerrilla action in Kashmir valley. Sheikh’s death in the broad daylight shootout came after a chain of guerrilla strikes which left two civilians dead and five more injured in Sopore.

Working as Medical Assistant, Sheikh was a regular State government employee. Coming from a prominent Jamaat-e-Islami family, Sheikh was a member of the ‘Shoora’ (Executive Committee) of Tehreek-e-Hurriyat which has Geelani as its founder-Chairman. His father Mohammad Yousuf Sheikh is Ameer-e-Halqa of Jamaat-e-Islami in Sopore.

Sheikh Altaf-ur-Rehman’s elder brother Sheikh Abdul Rauf had died in an incident of cross-firing after an IED blast outside Badami Bagh Cantonment in Srinagar in the year 2000. He was a Ph. D. scholar with Aligarh Muslim University. Sheikh Altaf was one of the most prominent separatist activists, owing allegiance to Geelani’s organisation, in Sopore. He had been arrested, detained and released over a dozen times in the last 20 years. He had been also detained under Public Safety Act as many as four times.

Sheikh’s assassination is remarkable in the sense that it is for the first time in the last over 10 years that a prominent anti-Indian and pro-Pakistan separatist functionary has been shot dead by the unidentified gunmen.

While as no militant outfit claimed responsibility, Hizbul Mujahideen “Supreme Commander” and United Jihad Council chief Syed Salah-ud-din and Chairman of the radical faction of Hurriyat Conference and Tehreek-e-Hurriyat, Syed Ali Shah Geelani, condemned Sheikh’s killing in separate statements. Both alleged that it was a handiwork of the “Indian secret agencies”. They paid tributes to Sheikh and asserted that his assassination would not deter the separatist leaders from pursuing the goal of “freedom from India”.

Geelani attributed Sheikh’s assassination directly to the “counter-terrorists” proposed by the Union Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar last month. He reminded that Parrikar had spoken of India’s plan to neutralise terrorism with terrorism. He called for a protest shutdown in Baramulla district on Wednesday.

Security forces and Jammu and Kashmir Police did not issue any statement on Sheikh’s killing or in reaction to Geelani’s allegation. However, DGP K.Rajendra Kumar was quoted by a local news agency to have said that the Police would unravel the truth. DIG Das refused to comment on Geelani’s allegation.

END

Omar calls PDP-BJP coalition a government of U-turns and surrenders

Ahmed Ali Fayyaz

_______

SRINAGAR, Jun 8: On completion of its first 100 days in office, National Conference President and former Chief Minister Omar Abdullah on Monday dismissed the PDP-BJP coalition as “a government of U-turns and surrenders”, claiming that it had failed on all fronts.

Coming out of its hibernation with the release of an exhaustive report on the performance of Mufti Mohammad Sayeed’s government in Jammu and Kashmir, National Conference marked the regime’s first milestone with a Press conference by Omar Abdullah. Omar declined to take questions on Afzal Guru’s execution with the argument that it could “rub salt over the old wounds”, but he asserted cogently that his Kashmir successor, PDP, had made abject surrenders before the Centre.

In reply to a question, Omar alleged that the Mufti government’s ostensible drive against encroachment of the forest land in Jammu was a brazen case of “discrimination” as the campaign was restricted only to the Muslim-dominated areas. He said he would welcome a genuine anti-encroachment campaign if it would have been initiated and carried out without the considerations of the caste, creed and colour.

 Over the reports of ‘saffornisation’ of the bureaucracy, Omar contended: “This issue pertains to the Chief Minister as the chief secretary has to take consent of the chief Minister who heads the GAD”. He claimed that GAD had not issued or withdrawn the order of giving respect to the State flag, alongside the National flag, without the mandatory approval of the State’s Chief Minister.

“Over AFSPA revocation, the PDP used to raise its pitch earlier but now it is completely mute. PDP-BJP’s agenda of alliance talks about the revocation of AFSPA, but no such measures have been taken and rather the state government stands divested of the right to even talk about AFSPA, which is unprecedented. Chief Minister Mufti Muhammad Sayeed continues to evade questions of AFSPA at official events and press interactions,” he said.

As regards the PDP’s claim that the Indian Constitution’s Aricle 370, that gives special status to the State of Jammu and Kashmir, would survive all odds, Omar referred to the BJP national spokesperson Meenakshi Lekhi’s May 26^th statement. In her statement, Ms Lekhi had asserted that the BJP was committed to its election-time promise of abrogation of Article 370.

Over the dialogue with Pakistan, Omar said: “Contrary to its previous claims, PDP now has surrendered its position over the issue and that BJP at present has been maintaining that terror and talks can’t go together”.

“Over the return of the power projects from NHPC, the NC Working President said, “In a brazen U-Turn, PDP voted against the resolution pertaining to return of power projects when National Conference introduced it in legislative council”

Over new recruitment policy, Omar maintained that in PDP’s Year of Youth, the first gift to the youth has made the youth wish and pray there are no more gifts. “The government’s draconian, suppressive tendencies have been an open secret from the very first week of its tenure. Besides protesting flood victims and traders, our employees too have been at the receiving end of the government’s batons,” he said.

Over what he termed the inordinate delay in rehabilitation of the flood victims, Omar said, “The sufferers have been let down by the government that foisted elections on them in the midst of devastation. Now the new government has demonstrated a complete lack of political will to start the dignified compensation and rehabilitation of the flood victims. The Finance Ministry has again suddenly run out of ideas and the CM has little to offer on his whirlwind chopper tours.”

“The alliance continued to be viewed with doubt and suspicion in both regions of the state. There is widespread discontent on frequent U-Turns and surrenders on political stands that had been taken earlier. There is mistrust and the ambiguity from the government of various key-issues has led to an increase in incidents of provocation and friction,” Omar added.

END