A group of local Kashmiris Tuesday snatched and buried the bodies of three Muslim militants shot by Indian security forces in Indian administered Kashmir.
A defence spokesman said the dead militants belonged to the Pakistan-based Lashkar-e-Taiba group and were Afghan nationals.
They had been shot earlier in the day in an encounter with a patrol from the army's specialist counter-insurgency unit, Rashtriya Rifles, in Rafiabad district, 50 kilometers (30 miles) north of the Kashmiri summer capital Srinagar.
The bodies were laid out for photraphing when a large crowd of local residents, shouting pro-Laskhar slogans, began pelting stones at the police and army personnel.
Troops fired shots over the heads of the protestors, who still managed to grab hold of the bodies and remove them for burial the same day, in accordance with Muslim custom.
According to Mehraj-u-din, a local photographer, this was "the first time" he had seen local people react in such "an angry manner" over the killing of foreign militants.
The militants had been planning to plant an explosive device on a highway used by military convoys, a police spokesman said.
The encounter came as the entire Kashmir valley was shut down by a strike to protest against alleged police maltreatment of Syed Ali Shah Geelani, hardline leader of the Jamat-i-Islami organisation.
Geelani, who has a history of heart problems, has been in hospital since Saturday when he fainted during a scuffle with police outside his residence.
All shops, schools and banks remained closed, while most traffic stayed off the roads -- BEHRAMPORA, India (AFP)
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