Four killed, 18 injured in Kashmir violence

Guerrilla attacks in Kashmir killed four people and injured 18 others on today, as India accused rival and neighbour Pakistan of funding and arming Islamic militants in the disputed region.

The attacks came as most schools, offices and shops in Srinagar, the summer capital of Jammu-Kashmir, closed in response to a strike called by the All Party Hurriyat Conference to protest the presence of Indian troops in the Himalayan state.

The conference is an umbrella group of Islamic and political parties demanding Kashmir’s separation from India.

A 12-year insurgency by Islamic guerrillas has killed 30,000 people, according to the government. Human rights groups say that estimate is too low.

India says Pakistan arms, trains, funds and harbours militants, who carry out terror attacks and strikes on military targets in Jammu-Kashmir. Pakistan says it provides the rebels only moral support, and that it has no control over their movement across the frontier.

India said today that militants’ training camps in Pakistan had not been closed down even after Islamabad joined the US-led alliance against terrorism. New Delhi calls Pakistan the haven for terrorists in the region.

‘‘There are scores of these training camps and there is no evidence that they have been shut down,’’ defence minister George Fernandes told the private Star News television channel.

‘‘From some of them, activity may have been shifted to another place to demonstrate to the Americans that, ‘See, we had a camp here and now it’s gone’.

‘‘I don’t have any reason to believe that there is any reduction in their efforts to train, equip and export militants to India.’’

Violence continued in the region.

In mountainous Kathua, militants destroyed a police jeep with a land mine today, killing four people and wounding three others, police spokesman Devinder Sharma said.

Ghazi Moinuddin, a spokesman for the Hezb-ul Mujahideen militant group, claimed responsibility for the attack. The Hezb is the largest of the guerrilla groups operating in Kashmir.

In four other grenade attacks by guerrillas, at least 15 people, including four soldiers, were injured in Srinagar, a police official said.

Eleven of those injured were civilians, hit by an errant grenade that was intended for a security patrol.

Today was the anniversary of the 1947 landing of Indian troops in the mostly Muslim Kashmir Valley after its Hindu ruler, Maharaja Hari Singh, signed an agreement merging his state into the Indian federation. The king took the step apparently to end fighting across the state.

India observes this day as Infantry Day. Muslim groups say the Hindu king had no authority to merge the state into India.

India and Pakistan have fought two wars over Kashmir since gaining independence from Britain in 1947. India controls two-thirds of the Himalayan territory and Pakistan the rest.