Jammu and Kashmir

Former cop steals weapons, joins jihad group, is killed in gunbattle with Indian troops

JAN 22, 2020 12:00 PM BY ROBERT SPENCER12 COMMENTS

Anyone who would have thought it might be prudent to try to discern his loyalties when he was hired as a police officer would have been denounced as “Islamophobic.”

“Former policeman among three militants killed in gunfight with Indian troops,” by Fayaz Bukhari, Reuters, January 20, 2020:

SRINAGAR, India (Reuters) – A former police officer was among three Islamist militants killed in a gunbattle with Indian troops in the disputed region of Kashmir on Monday, security officials said.

They said Adil Bashir Sheikh, a former special police officer, stole a cache of automatic weapons from the house of a local legislator in September 2018 and joined the militant group Hizbul Mujahideen.

He was killed along with two other men in the Shopian district of Kashmir after being surrounded by security forces.

The three men were responsible for the deaths of a dozen people, including four police officers, according to Dilbagh Singh, director general of Jammu and Kashmir Police.

“It is a major success for security forces,” he said. “It was a successful operation,” Singh told a news conference.

Kashmir, a Muslim-majority Himalayan territory, is claimed by both India and Pakistan and they have fought two wars over the region. Both claim it in full but rule it in part.

Tensions in Kashmir have been especially acute over the last year. India and Pakistan both said they carried out air strikes in enemy territory after a February 2019 suicide bombing by a Pakistan-based militant group killed dozens of Indian troops….