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LeT ultras kill teen inside mosque in Sopore

Last Updated 20 March 2013, 20:12 IST

Suspected Lashker-e-Toiba (LeT) militants shot dead a teenager inside a masjid in north Kashmir’s Sopore town on Tuesday night.

Police said militants fired on Suhail Ahmad Sofi, son of Ghulam Nabi, when he was sitting with his friend Ghulam Hyder in the grounds of the local masjid at 9:45 pm on Tuesday.

Suhail ran into the masjid and hid himself from the approaching gunmen. However, one of them managed to reach him and pumped five bullets which killed him on the spot.

“One militant chased him and entered the masjid and pumped five bullets into him, killed him on the spot. There was a religious congregation going on in the masjid at that time,” police added.

Superintendent of Police Sopore Imtiyaz Hussain said preliminary investigation into the matter revealed that LeT militants had killed him.

“We have registered a case in this regard and investigations are on,” he added.
Sources told Deccan Herald that Suhail, a student, was organising a cricket tournament sponsored by the Army in the area.

“Militants have ordered people in Sopore town not to keep any contact with security forces. In the last few years several people have been killed by LeT on the allegations of being police and army sources,” they added.

This was the third militant strike in North Kashmir this month. On March 8, militants killed a former terrorist-turned-counter-insurgent, Bashir Ahmad Gania, in the Tangmarg area of Baramulla district.

On March 2, two Indian Reserve Police men were shot dead by two militants at point blank range in North Kashmir’s Handwara town.

 Last month a ruling National Conference worker and a sarpanch were killed in the Kreeri area of Baramulla district by militants.

The incidents suggests an increase in the activities of the militants in north Kashmir in recent times, with the latest killing coming barely a week after fidayeen (suicide) militants stormed a Central Reserve Police Force camp in Bemina area of Srinagar killing five paramilitary personnel and injuring 10 others, including four civilians.

State Chief Minister Omar Abdullah, while strongly condemning Suhail’s killing, expressed dismay over a section of MLAs raising voices against incidents involving security forces, but preferring to be silent in the cases of innocent people dying in militant attacks.

 “If this kind of killing had been committed by security forces they would have torn their clothes, castigated the country and asked me to give the answer for spilling the innocent blood,” Omar said while making a statement about the incident in the Assembly in Jammu.

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(Published 20 March 2013, 20:12 IST)

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