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KASHMIR

Two-war Flashpoint Continues to Simmer
***Two u.rrs h.nc been fought over Kashmir and 12.000 people have died in rhe current lonfhcr over independence. India cLums rh.it people .in tired of the fighting and rh.tr Pakistani trained guerrilla'' are losing support A Gemini News Service corresponder went to see tor himself***
THE 22-year-old Kashm ui militant laid down his assault rifle slid a 9 mm pistol and grenade from under his poncho and settled down to described how his platoon executed the previous night s attack on a para military patrol in Srinagar, capital of the north Indian state of Kashmir
As captain' Amiad Khan talked, six similarly armed colleagues collected in the small house in Ikhraipura, unmindful of the fortified bunker of the para-military Border Security Force |BSF), barely 100 vards away in up town Srinagar
Having divested them selves of their weapons, which included two sophisticated sniper rifles and a rocket mope lied grenade launcher, they sat around sipping tea, intently listening to then com mander One of them was 17 years old
’As we fired on the three BSF >eepe with our grenade launcher they fled,' said Khan, section commander in the HizM Muphideen Kashmir » largest and best armed militant group. He joined the organisations about four years ago, soon after Kashmiri separatists launched their independence struggle in which over 12,000 people have died
'We chased them through the narrow alleys on foot, firing at the retreating )eeps, injuring at least three sol diets," he said
An hour later when the soldiers returned wit reinforcements to conduct a house to house search, the militants had secreted away
then arms and dispersed, un recognisable, into one of the many houses in the crowded middle class neighbourhood
An identity parade proved futile as none of the people in the area were forthcoming about the militants
By midnight all 12 mill tants, pan of the attack party were back in their homes, cel ebrating yet another blow for Kashmir s azadi or freedom, in India s only Muslim majority state
"The people are with us in our light for ie.Kk said Mumtaz, the section s mill tary strategist and religious adviser
Like his companion, the 26 year-old strategist said he was given training in weapons and explosives handling in neighbouring Pakistan, winch holds a third of Kashmir and lays claim to the rest Pakistan denies involvement
"We will carry on our uh»d or holy war to tne last Kash nun for freedom ' be said
But the security forces and locals feel otherwise
Army and paramilitary of hcials say militancy is on the decline and most Kashmiris across the disputed state ad nut weariness with the arnred separatist struggle which has brought death, misery and penury since it began in 1990
Many local Kashmiri lead ers, scared as they are of the separatists still talk of inde pendence, but privately admit that they do not know how many Kashmiris really favour independence from India
Some want a united Kashmir, as it was before 'irregulars' from Pakistan at tacked in 1947 occupying a thud of the undivided state then ruled by a Hindu king
' If the concept of azadt was widespread, the Indian security forces would have faced a mass civil disobedi ence movement impossible to contain.' said one political
trade i
The security forces claim militancy has been brought down to "acceptable levels of violence' and that the situa non is calm enough for the federal government to fulfil its commitment to hold state elections
Provided there are candi dates, people will vote as they are fed up with mill tancy ' said a senior army of heer
Elections in Kashmir were Iasi held in ]987 but the widespread allegations of rig ging substantially fuelled the subsequent separatist move
ment, leading to the government's dismissal in 1990 and imposition of federal rule
The current spell of federal rule — extended every six months — ends in July, after which further extension would require a constitutional amendment
Security officials, mean while, say the militants are short of arms and ammunition and that recruits are not as motivated as they were when hostilities began
As a result of extortion, rape and racketeering, the loss of public sympathy for the militants has led to an increased flow of intelligence from local people
Officials claim security forces are finding it difficult to process this flood of informs tion because of shortage of staff
Since 1990 more than 3,400 militants have been killed, over 16,000 arrested and large amounts of arms and explosives recovered by around 150,000 army and para military troops deployed on internal security duty across Kashmir .
Officials say some 12,000 assault rifles, 750 heavy ma chine guns, 540 rocket-propelled grenade launchers and over 3,700 anti personnel mines have also been recov-
ered.
Intelligence officials claim Kashmir's militant movement is sustained by foreign mercenaries, mainly Afghan veterans of the war against Soviet troops in Afghanistan.
Intelligence estimates of the numoer of Afghans in Kashmir's six main militant outfits vary from 600 to 800, while another 1,000 were believed to be waiting to cross into Kashmir
Militant leaders dismiss • such speculation as props ganda and say they have merely changed tactics by shifting the fight away from Srinagar s alleys and other towns to the Kashmiri countryside with the objective of tying down the security forces.
Besides moving to the mountainous region f Doda, through which pass all soutes from the lammu plains to the Kashmir valley and whose hilly, afforested region favours guerrilla activity, they tar geted high profile areas such as Chrar-e-Sharif, a town 30 miles from Srinagar, site of a wooden mosque highly revered by Kashmin Muslims Here they were locked in a stand-off with the security forces ringing the town. The army feared that any move considered hostile by the militants might result in them setting fire to the mosque, raising the spectre of a maM uprising by more than 4.5 million Muslims in the Kashmir valley And ultimately a devastating fire raged the revered shrine to ground, each side blaming the other for the ignition.