Top commander among 2 LeT militants killed in encounter

Srinagar: Two Lashkar-e-Toiba (LeT) militants, including a top commander of the outfit involved in several attacks, were killed in an overnight encounter with security forces in the Sopore area of Jammu and Kashmir's Baramulla district, police said on Friday. A police spokesperson said the security forces launched a cordon-and-search operation in the Warpora area of Sopore on Thursday, following specific information about the presence of ultras there.

During the search operation, as the presence of terrorists got ascertained, they were given repeated opportunities to surrender. However, instead of surrendering, they fired indiscriminately upon the joint search party which was retaliated, leading to an encounter," he said.

In the ensuing encounter, the spokesman said, two "categorised terrorists of proscribed terror outfit LeT" were killed and their bodies were retrieved from the site of the encounter.

He identified them as Fayaz Ahmad War alias Rukana alias Umar of Warpora, who was a top commander of the LeT, and Shaheen Ahmad Mir alias Shaheen Molvi of Cherpora Budgam. As per police records, both the slain terrorists were part of groups involved in various terror crime cases and several terror crime cases were registered against them," he added.

The spokesman said War had been associated with terrorism since 2008. Although he had surrendered earlier with arms and ammunition, after his release, he again worked as a terrorist associate for proscribed terror outfit HM and was detained under PSA. However, after his release in March 2020, he joined terrorist ranks of proscribed terror outfit LeT," he said. Besides being part of groups involved in several terror crime cases, War was very instrumental in planning and executing terror attacks on security establishments and civilian killings, and figured among the list of most-wanted terrorists in north Kashmir, the spokesman said.

He was the last active terrorist who perpetrated a series of various terror crimes and violence in north Kashmir which included attack on police party at Warpora Sopore in March last year in which one police personnel and a civilian got killed and the attack on joint naka party at Ahad Baba crossing on in April last year in which 3 CRPF personnel got killed," he said.