Five killed in Kashmir suicide attack

Srinagar, April 27 (IANS) Three soldiers and two suicide attackers were killed on Thursday in a 'fidayeen' attack on an army camp in Jammu and Kashmir's Kupwara district.

Seven other soldiers were injured in the assault.

"Fidayeen terrorists attacked the Panzgam army camp close to the Line of Control (LoC) around 4.30 a.m.," Defence Ministry spokesman Colonel Rajesh Kalia told IANS.

According to officials, the terrorists were "foreigners" and their identity was being ascertained.

The dead included 26-year-old Captain Ayush Yadav from Kanpur, Subedar Bhoop Singh from Rajasthan and Naik B.V. Ramanna from Visakhapatnam.

The injured were flown to Srinagar for treatment, defence ministry sources said. Reports said two of the injured soldiers were in critical condition.

Army officials in Delhi said the militants cut through the two-layered barbed wire fencing of the firing range of the camp, after which they lobbed hand grenades and fired indiscriminately.

According to the officials, Panzgam is the rear administrative area for over nine army units in Kupwara and spread over an area of 240,000 sq. metres.

The camp is about 20 km from Kupwara and some 10 km from the LoC.

The attackers were engaged by the Quick Reaction Team (QRT) and the intense gunfight lasted for 7-10 minutes, the officials said.

At least three AK-47 assault rifles, nine magazines, 156 rounds of AK-47, one Chinese pistol, one pistol magazine, one UBGL and three grenades, three matrix sheets, two GPS, one smartphone and one radio set were recovered from the possession of the suicide attackers.

The army spokesman said two terrorists were killed in the attack and a third managed to escape. An intense search was on to trace him.

The army also launched a search operation inside the camp to ascertain whether the militants had managed to sneak into the camp.