SRINAGAR: Indian troops on Sunday killed five alleged fighters in stepped-up military operations in occupied Kashmir, police said.

The five fighters, said to include a commander, were killed in two separate overnight operations by Indian troops south of Srinagar, police chief Vijay Kumar said.

“We had launched two separate operations on the basis of inputs about the presence of militants in these areas last night. Five militants, including JeM [Jaish-e-Mohammad] commander Zahid Wani ... were killed in these two operations,” Kumar claimed.

A police officer was shot dead outside his residence on Saturday evening in the south of Srinagar, he said.

In January, 21 fighters were killed across the disputed Himala­yan region, according to police. Last year more than 189 fighters were killed there, a police official added.

A spokesperson for the Foreign Office (FO) in Islamabad said the Indian occupation forces had martyred at least 23 Kashmiris in fake encounters and so-called cordon-and-search operations in January alone.

Pakistan assails the extrajudicial killings

He also condemned the extrajudicial killing of the five Kashmiris in Pulwama and Budgam in Indian Illegally Occupied Jammu and Kashmir (IIOJK) on Sunday and called for “international accountability” of the Indian forces.

“We also reiterate our call on the international community, including the United Nations, to hold India accountable for its gross and systematic human rights violations and crimes against humanity in IIOJK,” the spokesperson said in a press release.

“Driven by the far-right extremist Hindutva ideology that provoked and condoned genocide of Muslims, the Indian forces were relentlessly targeting the Kashmiris, especially youth, in the occupied territory. The international community must act to stop this wanton oppression and persecution of the besieged Kashmiris under illegal occupation,” said the FO statement.

Published in Dawn, January 31st, 2022