12 killed in Kashmir, despite cease-fire

INDIAN security forces battled rebels in Kashmir and suspected insurgents detonated a grenade in a busy market Thursday in violence that left 12 people dead.

Elsewhere along the 700-mile Indian-Pakistani frontier, both countries' armies held their fire for a second day in the first formal cease-fire between the two nuclear-armed neighbours in 14 years.

But the separatists have vowed to persist with their attacks in Kashmir , and New Delhi said it would continue targeting suspected militants infiltrating its area of Kashmir.

A shopkeeper was killed by a grenade at a security checkpoint at Lal Chowk, Srinagar's commercial hub, police officer Javed Ahmed said. Nine people were wounded.

Four suspected rebels were killed in a pre-dawn gun battle in the village of Nowgam, about 60 miles north of Srinagar. The militants, believed to belong to Pakistan-based group Hezb-ul-Mujahadeen, were surrounded by security forces in the village, said Ahmed. Also near the Line of Control, a police officer was shot and killed by unidentified gunmen in the town of Hundwara, Ahmed said. Rebels were suspected in the attack.

Separately, four militants were killed in a gunfight after a joint patrol of police and Indian army spotted a group of guerrillas in a remote mountainous area of Udhampur district, said a police officer. Also, soldiers of the Border Security Force shot dead two suspected militants near the Ghat area of Doda district