From: fsqazi@rodan.acs.syr.edu ()
Subject: Indian Troops Kill 40 in Kashmir
Organization: Syracuse University
Date: Thu, 7 Jan 93 11:56:24 EST


   New York Times report, January 7. 


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       Indian Troops Reportedly Kill 40 in Kashmir Raid
		 
		 By Edward A. Gargan

 
  NEW DELHI, Jan 6.  Indian paramilitary forces rampaged through a town
in the Vale of Kashmir today, killing at least 40 people and setting 
houses and markets ablaze, according to reports from Kashmir. More than    
100 people were reported wounded in what was described as indiscriminate
firing by Indian forces.

  If confirmed, the death toll would be the worst in Kashmir since May     
1990, when security forces opened fire on a funeral procession for the 
region's leading Islamic cleric, killing 67 people.

  Today's shootings came when security forces surrounded Sopore, a town
of 50,000 people 25 miles northwest of Srinagar, the capital of Kashmir.
The troops sealed all access to the town and began house-to-house 
searches for Islamic guerrillas who are fighting for secession from       
India.

  Kashmir's population is predominantly Muslim, and resentment has grown
in recent years over what is regarded as repressive treatment by the 
Hindu-dominated central Government.

  Witnesses quoted by an Associated Press reporter in Kashmir said that
at one point, 15 soldiers opened fire on people in an open-air market.
The troops then began setting fire to the market stalls and shops, and
within hours the blaze had spread to five residential neighborhoods.
Witnesses also said soldiers fired on a bus and set fire to an automobile
with the occupants trapped inside.

  Telephone links to Kashmir have been virtually nonexistent for two 
months, and it was impossible to confirm these and other reports.

  The Associated Press said the attack appeared to be in retaliation for    
the deaths of two soldiers killed recently by a land mine outside Sopore.

  For three years the four million residents of the Vale of Kashmir have 
been in open rebellion against the Government, which has never allowed        
them to vote on whether they want to be part of India. Aided by training
and weapons from Pakistan, guerrillas have fought to sever the region
from Indian control. But among the guerrillas there is open disagreement
about whether Kashmir should become independent or whether it should 
join Pakistan, which also claims the territory.

  S. Narendra, the senior Government spokesman, denied that security
forces had engeged in a massacre. "Militants attacked a party of Border
Security Forces," he said, "and reinforcements were rushed to the scene 
and an exchange of fire ensued in which about 30 to 40 people were        
killed."

  He said that nearby shops were storehouses for illegal explosives and
blew upduring the firefight and that 50 to 100 shops were burned down.
Prime Minister P. V. Narasimha Rao has ordered the Governer of Jammu
and Kashmir to investigate, Mr. Narendra added.

  Indian forces, in their effort to subdue the insurgency, have tortured 
and killed civilians and burned entire neighborhoods, according to the 
human rights groups Asia Watch and Amnesty International. For two months
security forces in Kashmir have clamped down more vigorously on the 
guerrillas.

  The Government denies that human rights violations occur, although in 
an interview last Monday, the spokesman for the Government of Kashmir, 
Rammohan Rao, said occasional exesses may occur. " When you do a search,"
he said, "there's always a chance something can go wrong." 


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Qazi