Rafiabad, Aug 10: Five unidentified foreign militants who were killed in the 24-hour-long gunfight with government forces at Rafiabad forests were buried in Hamam Markote Rafaibad area of the north Kashmir’s of Baramulla district on Thursday evening.
Army today claimed that they were affiliated with Lashkar-e-Toiba militant outfit and huge cache of arms and ammunition was recovered from the site of gunfight.
Sources said the slain militants were buried with the help of local Auqaf committee at a graveyard in Hamam Markote village.
Meanwhile, while addressing media, Commandant of Army’s 7 Sector, Dharam Raj Rai in a press conference today said that government forces had credible intelligence inputs about the presence of militants in jungles and adjoining areas of Rafiabad with effect from August 05.
He said that on August 07, they got “credible information” about the infiltration bid in the Lidder Panzal area “because of which we had placed a number of interception groups to trap these militants.”
Rai said that in the wee hours on August 08, while carrying out search of the area, “a search party was fired upon by the hiding militants in the jungle. In the ensuing gunfight for several hours, forces killed all five heavily armed militants.”
He said soldier Naresh Chander Bhutt of 9 Para was also injured earlier, who was evacuated to hospital for treatment by helicopter.
The Army officer said “huge quantity of arms and ammunition was recovered from the possession of the slain militants.” The recoveries, he said include 4 AK 47 rifles, one pistol and a large amount of war-like stores.
