At least 600 people in India-administered Kashmir, which includes Indian soldiers, local police and 160 civilians, lost their lives to violence.
An eight-month-old baby Nitin Kumar, a senior journalist Shujaat Bukhari, an alleged police informer Shameema Akhtar, a Class 7 student Andleeb Jan, a 14-year-old rebel fighter Mudasir Ahmad Parrey, and an Indian army commando Mukul Meena: they’re among nearly 600 people killed this year in disputed Kashmir in what’s being dubbed as “deadliest year” in about a decade.
According to a monitoring group Jammu and Kashmir Coalition of Civil Society (JKCCS), some 586 people were killed in India-administered Kashmir, a region bitterly contested by nuclear-rivals Pakistan and India since 1947 and where a low-intensity armed conflict has been raging for the last 30 years.
The dead include 159 Indian soldiers and the police, 267 rebel fighters, and 160 civilians.
Figures from the authorities as well as local accounts show violence in the Himalayan region spiked especially after 2014 when India elected a right-wing government of Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) led by Narendra Modi.
Modi-led government has avoided peace talks on Kashmir with neighbouring Pakistan, backing a hard-line military approach instead.
“The result is in front of you,” JKCCS coordinator Khurram Parvez told TRTWorld by phone from Srinagar, the summer capital of the picturesque region.
https://www.trtworld.com/magazine/2018-is-disputed-kashmir-s-deadliest-year-in-a-decade-22851/amp
