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| CRPF fully prepared to face militants' threat | | Fidayeen to target Army unit headquarters in J&K | | B L KAK
NEW DELHI: SEPT. 10:
Fidayeen, or Islamist suicide bombers, have plans to target Indian Army's unit headquarters in Jammu and Kashmir. And if latest radio intercepts were any guide, fidayeen operations will also be directed against the local police units in the troubled State. A radio intercept, which was meant for the Lashkar-e-Toiba (LeT) cadres in Jammu and Kashmir, conveyed clear instructions calling for lightning raids on Indian security establishments and convoys of defence personnel.
Areas identified for the recommended fidayeen strikes are located in the districts of Srinagar, Baramulla and Kupwara in the Kashmir Valley and in the districts of Poonch and Rajouri in Jammu region. A series of terrorist incidents in the State so far have established the fact that fidayeen are armed with highly sophisticated bombs and improvised explosive devices (IEDs). And they possess skills to penetrate heavily guarded establishments and lay siege to fortified security forces' camps.
In recent months, a few notable successes were notched up by the Indian security forces in Jammu and Kashmir, particularly in Rajouri and Poonch districts. The killing of several notorious militant leaders-at least four of them had eluded the police and paramilitary forces for about four years-did provide some encouragement to the security forces. But this has had little impact on the terrorist activity per se, according to impartial observers.
Ministries of Defence and Home Affairs are said to be in receipt of evidence vis-à-vis 'determination' on part of armed militants, or suicide squads, to intensify their attacks on the Army and paramilitary forces posts as well as on the police officers. And if the radio intercepts were any indication, the militants would make excessive use of mortars and grenades for this purpose.
The Union Home Ministry is closely monitoring the ebb and flow of the counter insurgency operations by the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) in Kashmir. The CRPF is curently the nodal agency for counter insurgency operations in Kashmir. And the CRPF, Director-General, JK Sinha, let it be known on Sunday that his force "is fully prepared to face any challenge posed by foreign militants in the Valley". Sinha was quoted as stating in a media interview: "We have been fighting with the foreign militants for many years now. It does not make any diference to us whether they belong to Lashkar-e-Toiba or Al Qaeda. We are fully prepared to deal with them".
The CRPF Director-General also placed himself on record as asserting that his force personnel are "fully equipped and quite capable to deal with all the militants, be it indigenous or foreign". And at a time when the talk of the presence in J&K of Al Qaeda traces has, of late, intensified, JK Sinha declared that the CRPF personnel "are always ready for new challenges".
According to the CRPF chief, the level of infiltration in Jammu and Kashmir has come down "to a great extent" following the completion of barbed fencing along the border. He admitted at the same time that the fencing becomes weak and gets damaged during winters as a result of heavy snowfall. This, obvfiously, leads to infiltration of militants into the Indian territory from across the border.
The CRPF, which has taken responsibility of counter insurgency, in place of the Border Security Force (BSF), expects that the exercisxe of taking full responsibility of counter insurgency operations in Jammu and Kashmir will be completed in March next year.
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