Fayaz Bukhari
SRINAGAR, Jan 30: Three militants including top commander of Lashkar-e-Toiba (LeT) were killed during a fierce gun battle in North Kashmir’s Lolab area today.
Deputy Inspector General (DIG) of Police North Kashmir, Garib Dass, told Excelsior that they had information about this LeT group for a long time and they were operating in the area since July last year. He identified the LeT commander who was killed last night as Abu Usama alias Zarar.
Dass said that they received information about movement of the LeT group into the village yesterday and had laid an ambush outside Khar Mohalla in Dardpora Lolab.
The operation was launched by a joint team of Army’s 28 RR and SOG Kupwara. As soon as the group approached near the village, they were fired upon leading to a gun battle in which LeT commander was killed. One AK-47 rifle was recovered from his possession.
The other two militants rushed to the village and took shelter in the house of Shah Zaman Chohan. Later, additional reinforcement from 18 RR and SOG were rushed to the village and siege was laid around it.
The cordon around village was tightened and in the morning house to house searches were conducted and contact with the two militants was established at around noon.
Army and SOG used mortar shells and razed the house to rubble in which two militants were killed. They have been identified as Abu Mushtaq Hyder and Abu Rashid Suliaman Qadri.
Bodies of both the militants were retrieved and two AK-47 rifles, 15 magazines, hundreds of bullets, 4 wireless sets, three grenades, one pistol, two GPS devices, one Thuraya, one matrix sheet, clothes, medicine and ration were recovered from them.
The LeT commander, Abu Usama, along with four others had infiltrated into Lolab area from Pakistan occupied Kashmir some six months back and were hiding inside Lolab forests.
Soon after the encounter people took to streets and clashed with police. They threw stones at Army and police vehicles following which the forces resorted to tear smoke shells and baton charge against the protesters.
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