05-02-2006, 01:52 AM
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin--><b>Kashmir killings </b>
The Pioneer Edit Desk
Jihadis hit at soft targets ---- Though no militant group has claimed responsibility for the killing of 19 Hindus in Panjdobi and Thava villages in Doda district on Sunday night, and the slaughter of 13 Hindus in Ludana village of Udhampur district over the weekend, the savage massacres bear the unmistakable imprint of the Pakistan-based Islamist terrorist outfit Lashkar-e-Tayyeba.
Not surprisingly, the Inspector-General of Police, Jammu, has identified it as the perpetrator of the gruesome killings. The first large-scale killing of Hindus in the State after the gunning down of 24 Kashmiri Pandits in Nadimarg village near Shopian in Pulwama district in 2003, the ghastly attacks in Doda and Udhampur districts clearly indicate a sharp rise in the incidence of strikes by Pakistan-based Islamist groups, notwithstanding claims by the UPA Government that there has been a decline in Islamabad-sponsored cross-border terrorism.
That this should happen is hardly a surprise. They have reason to be angry. Despite their call for a boycott of the polling in the four Assembly constituencies in which by-elections were held last Monday, voter turnout averaged 61 per cent, with the highest (72 per cent) at Bhaderwah in Jammu and the lowest (40.34 per cent) at Sangrama. <b>Not only that, the People's Democratic Front, whose chief, Ms Mehbooba Mufti, had suddenly started talking of Pakistan-based terrorists as "mujaheedin" and those killed in clashes with members of the security forces as "martyrs", lost in two of the three constituencies in which it had contested</b>.
Pakistan-based terrorist outfits like the Lashkar-e-Tayyeba, the Jaish-e-Mohammad and the Hizb-ul Mujaheedin had every reason to be upset with the voter turnout and results, which once indicated that the people of J&K, were fed up with continued cross-border terrorism and wanted a return to peaceful ways.
They, therefore, felt it necessary to send the message across that they continued to have the ability to hit hard and those who defied them did so at their own peril. They did it the way they have been doing it ever since cross-border terrorism assumed the dimensions of covert warfare over a decade-and-a-half ago - raise the level of terrorist attacks and strike at the softest possible targets, unprotected people in remote and isolated villages.
In the present case, they found it all the easier to do so because, with summer melting the snow in the higher mountain passes, Pakistan-based terrorists, who use these, could once again cross over to India without much difficulty. While terrorist strikes become more frequent every year with the advent of summer, the outrage has a particular significance this year because it shows that there has been no diminution of terrorists' ability to strike despite the tough measures that Pakistani claims to have taken against them.
This not only underlines the need for continued vigil on the part of the security forces but also raises serious questions about the sincerity of Pakistan's claim of fighting terrorism. Islamabad must be told categorically that the future of the entire ongoing composite dialogue process between India and Pakistan hinges on its sincerity in fighting fundamentalist Islamist terrorism and curbing acts of cross-border violence against India.
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The Pioneer Edit Desk
Jihadis hit at soft targets ---- Though no militant group has claimed responsibility for the killing of 19 Hindus in Panjdobi and Thava villages in Doda district on Sunday night, and the slaughter of 13 Hindus in Ludana village of Udhampur district over the weekend, the savage massacres bear the unmistakable imprint of the Pakistan-based Islamist terrorist outfit Lashkar-e-Tayyeba.
Not surprisingly, the Inspector-General of Police, Jammu, has identified it as the perpetrator of the gruesome killings. The first large-scale killing of Hindus in the State after the gunning down of 24 Kashmiri Pandits in Nadimarg village near Shopian in Pulwama district in 2003, the ghastly attacks in Doda and Udhampur districts clearly indicate a sharp rise in the incidence of strikes by Pakistan-based Islamist groups, notwithstanding claims by the UPA Government that there has been a decline in Islamabad-sponsored cross-border terrorism.
That this should happen is hardly a surprise. They have reason to be angry. Despite their call for a boycott of the polling in the four Assembly constituencies in which by-elections were held last Monday, voter turnout averaged 61 per cent, with the highest (72 per cent) at Bhaderwah in Jammu and the lowest (40.34 per cent) at Sangrama. <b>Not only that, the People's Democratic Front, whose chief, Ms Mehbooba Mufti, had suddenly started talking of Pakistan-based terrorists as "mujaheedin" and those killed in clashes with members of the security forces as "martyrs", lost in two of the three constituencies in which it had contested</b>.
Pakistan-based terrorist outfits like the Lashkar-e-Tayyeba, the Jaish-e-Mohammad and the Hizb-ul Mujaheedin had every reason to be upset with the voter turnout and results, which once indicated that the people of J&K, were fed up with continued cross-border terrorism and wanted a return to peaceful ways.
They, therefore, felt it necessary to send the message across that they continued to have the ability to hit hard and those who defied them did so at their own peril. They did it the way they have been doing it ever since cross-border terrorism assumed the dimensions of covert warfare over a decade-and-a-half ago - raise the level of terrorist attacks and strike at the softest possible targets, unprotected people in remote and isolated villages.
In the present case, they found it all the easier to do so because, with summer melting the snow in the higher mountain passes, Pakistan-based terrorists, who use these, could once again cross over to India without much difficulty. While terrorist strikes become more frequent every year with the advent of summer, the outrage has a particular significance this year because it shows that there has been no diminution of terrorists' ability to strike despite the tough measures that Pakistani claims to have taken against them.
This not only underlines the need for continued vigil on the part of the security forces but also raises serious questions about the sincerity of Pakistan's claim of fighting terrorism. Islamabad must be told categorically that the future of the entire ongoing composite dialogue process between India and Pakistan hinges on its sincerity in fighting fundamentalist Islamist terrorism and curbing acts of cross-border violence against India.
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