Two Jaish-e-Muhammad militants were killed in a gunfight with the security forces in this south Kashmir district on Tuesday.
A police official said a joint party of the security forcescomprising of Army’s 19 RR, CentralReserve Police Force and Special Operations Goup (SOG) of Jammu and Kashmirpolice cordoned off the forest area of Kharpora and Kachwan in Larnoo area ofKokernag this afternoon and launched searches. “The militants present thereopened fire on the search party. The fire was retaliated triggering a gunfightin which two militants were killed,” the official added.
He identified one of the slain militants as Faisal Nazeer,22, a B Tech graduate originally hailing from AakhuraMattan and presentlyresiding at NaibastiAnantnag. The deceased militant, according to the source,had joined the JeM outfit nearly 45-days ago.
The official said that another slain militant is a Pakistaninational. “As the firing stopped, the bodies of both the militants wereretrieved and the operation was called off,” he said adding two weapons andother incriminating material was also recovered from the gun battle site.
A source said that when the gun battle was on the securityforces used choppers to trace the hiding militants.
Pertinently, in theearly morning hours, massive searches were launched by the security forces inKehripora- SoafShali and Hangalgund villages of Kokernag, but the operation wascalled off after nothing was found there.
PROTESTS, CLASHES IN ANANTNAG TOWN, KOKERNAG VILLAGES
As the word about the killing of two militants spread insouth Kashmir youth came out on streets and pelted security forces with stonesat Khanabal, Naibasti, Lalchowk and some other areas of old town. Protests andclashes also broke in several villages of Kokernag.
Meanwhile, the 2G internet service which was resumed in thedistrict after four days was suspended again following the encounter.