Security forces on Tuesday neutralised wanted sniper and nephew of Jaish-e-Mohammed chief Maulana Masood Azhar in an encounter in South Kashmir’s Tral. The slain militant, Usman Haider, was suspected to have been behind the sniper attacks carried out earlier this month.
The forces have recovered an M-4 Carbine which they claim was used for carrying out sniper attacks on security personnel. A total of two terrorists were gunned down in the encounter.
The officials have not identified the bodies of the terrorists yet but a video shared by JeM on social media identified one of the eliminated militants as Usman Haider. The forces said that the material seized from the encounter site as well as intelligence inputs confirmed that the terrorists belonged to JeM.
Since mid-September, three security personnel were killed in an almost similar fashion which prompted the agencies to devise a new strategy to thwart such strikes. The security forces found that the terrorists had used snipers from a nearby hillock to carry out the attacks.
The first sniper attack was carried out on September 18 in which a CRPF personnel was injured. Later, the militants carried out similar attacks in which a Sashastra Seema Bal personal and an Army jawan, and a CISF jawan in Nowgam were killed.
Earlier, the forces based on intelligence inputs belived that at least two separate groups of JeM comprising two terrorists each had entered Kashmir Valley in September. They also suspected that terrorists had been trained by Pakistan’s ISI for carrying out sniper attacks in Kashmir Valley.