Srinagar: Three heavily armed militants suspected to be from Pakistan were killed on Thursday after they launched an attack on an army camp in north Kashmir’s Kupwara district.
A huge cache of arms and ammunition were recovered from the militants, who were also carrying medicines with Pakistani markings.
An army official said that the militants opened fire on an army camp at Langate in Kupwara district at around 5 am, which was retaliated by the jawans.
After repulsing the attack, the security forces launched a search operation in the area, during which the militants fired upon them, leading to an encounter.
Briefing the media on the operation, Commanding Officer, Colonel Rajiv Sharang said the three militants were challenged by jawans after they noticed suspicious movement near the perimeter fencing of the camp.
“Three terrorists were seen near the perimeter fencing of our camp. Our sentrys challenged the terrorists who fired heavily on our sentry posts. We also retaliated and then a quick reaction team was activated so that the terrorists do not flee the area where they were spotted.”
“We used illumination rounds to illuminate the area and killed all the three terrorists,” Col Sharang told reporters at Langate.
The army official said the forces have recovered a huge cache of arms and ammunition from the slain militants. “The medicine which has been recovered from all three terrorists has Pakistani marking. This ascertains that all three terrorists were Pakistani terrorists. The maps and the matrix sheet, which they were using, that also is being analysed. If we come to know more from it, we will let you know,” he said.
Asked whether there could have been more militants, Col Sharang said there could have been more but we had spotted only three, so we take it that there were only three terrorists who had approached the periphery fencing.
He said the search and sensitisation operation in the area was on. “We will share more details about the operation with you whenever we have it,” he said.
On a question on the recovery of four radio-sets from the three militants, the army official said, “There are times that the terrorists carry more than one radio-set also, so that is why from the three terrorists, we have recovered four radio-sets and there are three GPS devices”.
Apart from 3 AK assault rifles, ammunition, 4 radio sets, 3 Global Positioning System (GPS) device, medicines and other ‘war like stores’ were also recovered from the slain militants.
PTI