Over dozen wounded in clashes as JKLF opens branch in Srinagar

Srinagar, Nov 26 (UNI) More than a dozen people were wounded as a group of locals clashed with activists of the Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF) to prevent the pro-independence outfit from opening its office in a downtown locality of the city, police said.

They said JKLF activists, led by chairman Yasin Malik, had gathered at Bohri Kadal in the downtown city this morning to open an office of the outfit.

Immediately after the inauguration, a group of locals assembled at Bohri Kadal and started raising anti-JKLF and pro-Pakistan slogans and also demanded that the pro-independence outfit shift its office from the area, police added.

The sloganeering soon turned violent as clashes broke out between the two groups, they said.

More than a dozen people were wounded in the stone-pelting and exchange of blows, police said, adding they have been hospitalised.

The JKLF's office at Bohri Kadal is located near the headquarters of the Awami Action Committee (AAC), led by Mirwaiz Umar Farooq, at Rajouri Kadal and also not far from Mujahid Manzil from where National Conference founder Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah launched the ''Quit Kashmir Movement'' in early 1940s.

It is the same place from where militants attacked security forces for the first time in the Valley in 1989, marking the onset of insurgency in Jammu and Kashmir.

The first gunshot was fired on the security forces by three masked JKLF militants later identified as Ashfaq Majid Wani, Sheikh Hamid and Yasin Malik.

In 1994, the JKLF renounced the ''armed struggle'' and launched a non-violent ''movement to seek independence'' for Jammu and Kashmir.

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