Four killed in Kashmir as Pakistan blows up TV tower

Pakistani artillery blew up a television tower and suspected Islamic separatists killed four civilians in the Indian-controlled part of Kashmir early today, despite assurances that the tensions are easing.

Suspected guerrillas dragged four Muslim brothers out of their home in a remote mountainous village and shot them dead, a police officer said on condition of anonymity.

No one claimed responsibility for the attack in Barneli in Udhampur district, 140 kilometres (90 miles) north of Jammu, the winter capital of India’s Jammu and Kashmir state.

The attackers apparently suspected that the four had been informing police about guerrilla movements in the area, the officer said. India accuses Pakistan of supporting the guerrillas.

Both sides resumed shelling today across the Line of Control that divides Kashmir, the flash point in the dispute that has nuclear-armed India and Pakistan on the verge of war.

Shelling by the Pakistanis wounded the driver, ticket taker and mechanic on a passenger bus that was hit in the Punch sector close to the Line of Control, the Indian police officer said.

Police said the tall metal television tower was destroyed in the Dhar Gloon area, also in the Punch sector, which is 200 kms (125 miles) north of Jammu. No one was injured.

Exchange of artillery, mortar and machine-gun fire by the two armies continued overnight along the Line of Control and the international border, police said.

No deaths were immediately reported from the cross border shelling.

On the Pakistani side, police said the Indian shelling stopped on Saturday night but resumed early today. Some people took advantage of the lull to pack their belongings and flee to safety.

Heavy firing by both sides was reported in the Kahuta Forward area, in the Bagh district, nearly 100 kms (62 miles) southeast of Muzaffarabad, the capital of Pakistani-controlled Kashmir.

However, the threat of war between India and Pakistan, which have massed about one million troops at their border since December, appeared to lessen Saturday as both sides reported a easing of tensions.

After visiting India and Pakistan to urge both sides to seek a peaceful resolution, Deputy American Secretary of State Richard Armitage said Saturday in Estonia that both countries seemed prepared to make conciliatory gestures.

Jammu and Kashmir state is the only Muslim-majority state in predominantly Hindu India.

Guerrillas have been fighting there since 1989 to carve out a separate homeland of Kashmir or to merge Kashmir with Pakistan. India and Pakistan both claim Kashmir in its entirety, and that dispute has been at the root of two of the three wars they have fought.

The Kashmir insurgency, the cause of the current tensions, has claimed more than 60,000 lives. Pakistan says it offers diplomatic and moral support to the militants, but denies India’s contention that it arms them.