At least a dozen protesters suffered injuries in Indian-held Kashmir Wednesday as security forces fired teargas and pellets at angry mourners who defied a curfew to hold a funeral for a slain freedom fighter, witnesses and police said. Authorities had imposed a curfew in parts of the disputed territory after three freedom fighters were killed in a firefight with government forces overnight.
But hundreds of mourners defied the order to organise funerals for the slain freedom fighters, sparking violent clashes with police at one of the ceremonies held in the main city of occupied Srinagar, witnesses said. The mourners shouted slogans such as "Go India, go back" and "We want freedom" and pelted stones at police who fired teargas and pellets.
"At least a dozen protesters were injured with pellets in their heads and limbs," a police officer told AFP on condition of anonymity. Authorities had erected checkpoints and blockades along main roads in occupied Srinagar to prevent residents from holding protests or attending funerals for the freedom fighters who were killed in a shootout south of the city.
The overnight firefight came amid high tension after gunmen shot dead seven Hindu pilgrims and injured 19 others in the disputed Himalayan region on Tuesday. Soldiers and counterinsurgency police cordoned off a neighbourhood in Redbugh village late Tuesday after learning about the presence of armed freedom fighters in a house, a police officer said. "After the night-long standoff, all three militants were killed when they tried to break the cordon," the officer said.
There is no suggestion the shootout was linked with the attack on a bus shuttling Hindus on an annual pilgrimage to a Himalayan cave revered as the abode of the god Shiva. Jitendra Singh, minister of state in the Prime Minister's Office, said police and security forces were still carrying out investigations. "No one should jump to any conclusion on the attack. Let us wait for the definite inferences and inputs," he told reporters in occupied Srinagar. Separately on Wednesday, army spokesman Colonel Rajesh Kalia told AFP two soldiers were killed in cross-border firing by Pakistani troops in Kupwara district, near LoC, without providing further details.