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Bloody day in Kashmir
SRINAGAR, Indian-administered Kashmir (CNN) -- In the worst day of violence in Indian-controlled Kashmir since a new provincial government took power, at least 17 people were killed and dozens injured in a spate of bloody attacks in the region. At least 12 people were killed and 26 wounded when a mine exploded underneath their convoy in southern Kashmir on Saturday. The dead include eight soldiers and two women and two children who were family members of the soldiers also died. Two other soldiers and two civilians who were in the convoy were missing. Two Islamic militant groups fighting Indian rule in Kashmir, Hizbul Mujahedeen and Al Badr, have claimed responsibility for the incident. Police said they believe militants were targeting the soldiers when they planted the landmine, which sent a truck and a private bus carrying the soldiers careening off the highway and into a gorge. The incident took place in Lower Munda, in the southern district of Anantnag, on the main highway linking Srinagar to Jammu. Some of the wounded were airlifted to Srinagar. Motorcade attackedAlso, in Anantnag, a motorcade of a state government minister came under automatic weapon gunfire, authorities said. Three policemen were injured when they jumped out of their vehicle to respond to the attack, but they were not shot. Peerzada Muhammed Sayed, the Jammu and Kashmir state minister of rural development, was unharmed, authorities said. An official police spokesman said the attackers fired at some distance from the motorcade. Police in Jammu and Kashmir, the Indian-administered province in Kashmir, reported other attacks Saturday. • Two activists of the National Conference Party in Srinagar, a pro-Indian Kashmiri party, were shot and killed. • Suspected militants fired at a police patrol in the city, killing one constable and seriously wounding a police officer. • Suspected militants threw a hand grenade at a police vehicle in Srinagar, wounding four police personnel. • On Srinagar-Baramulla Road, near the city, a makeshift bomb went off under an army vehicle and wounded a soldier. • In Gushi Nagri in Kupwara District in Kashmir, an India security officer and a militant were killed during a gunbattle. Camp raidSaturday's violence follows a raid on an Indian police camp on Friday which left six officers dead and nine others wounded. Six members of India's Central Reserve Police Force were killed and nine others wounded after two suspected militants launched a suicide attack on a police camp in the disputed province of Kashmir. Friday's attack was the first since Kashmir's new government was sworn in and is a major blow to hopes that the administration may foster the push for peace in the disputed Himalayan region. Kashmir has triggered two of the three wars between India and Pakistan and was at the heart of a 10-month military standoff between the two nuclear powers earlier this year. Islamabad denies Indian allegations that it is arming, training and sending militants into Muslim-majority Kashmir and says it only gives diplomatic and moral support to what it calls the Kashmiri people's struggle for self-determination. -- From CNN Producer Ram Ramgopal and Mukhtar Ahmad
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