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Militants attack army camp, kill 7 soldiers

Mukhtar Ahmad in Srinagar

At least seven soldiers -- a company commander, two junior commissioned officers and four jawans -- were killed in a fierce gun battle when militants attacked an army camp at village Chak Natnussa in Jammu and Kashmir's border district of Kupwara early Friday.

Six militants, including the infamous Salim Kashmiri alias Chattan, were also killed.

A senior police officer told rediff.com that a group of heavily armed militants attacked the 3rd Rashtriya Rifles camp in the wee hours with rockets, grenades and assault rifles. A major and two junior commissioned officers were killed on the spot. Ten soldiers were seriously injured.

Sources said the heavily armed militants, some 40 in number, first fired rockets and rocket propelled grenades. Then they rained bullets on the camp.

Initial reports said the militants had entered the camp. But Major General Kaushal, general officer commanding Victor Force, denied this. Talking to newsmen in Srinagar, he said that the militants had made use of the houses around the camp for their attack. Whereupon, the RR soldiers, led by their company commander who died in the battle, returned fire.

Of the six militants killed, four are foreigners.

The police said that the gun battle continued for several hours.

The rest of the militants, however, escaped under cover of darkness. The area has been cordoned off and searches are continuing. But officials admit in private that these may not be fruitful.

"They may have already escaped from the area," an official said.

This is the second attack in the recent past on a security force camp in the valley. Last month militants had attacked the Border Security Force sector headquarters at Bandipore, killing a deputy inspector general, a deputy commandant and four others.

Meanwhile, the authorities have ordered a massive security beef-up across the valley. Additional troops have been sent to Kupwara, from where the authorities had on Thursday withdrawn the army and replaced it with the Central Reserve Police Force.

In unconnected incidents on Thursday night, militants also shot dead three civilians including two brothers at Lalpora Kupwara, while security forces killed three foreign militants in an encounter in Kupwara.

And in Anantnag, troops killed the intelligence chief of Hizbul Mujaheedin in an exchange of fire.

Earlier report

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