India starts scaling down security in Kashmir

SRINAGAR | Tue Oct 5, 2010 7:54pm IST

(Reuters) - Authorities in Srinagar began removing some security bunkers on Tuesday as part of New Delhi's efforts to defuse tensions in the troubled region.

Kashmir has been in a siege-like state of strikes, protests and curfew for months, threatening to undermine rule from New Delhi, which has been fighting an armed separatist rebellion in the region since 1989.

More than 100 people have been killed and scores arrested in protests since June -- among the biggest since an armed separatist rebellion broke out in Kashmir in 1989.

"We have started removing (security) bunkers in Srinagar, the complete process will take couple of days," said Prabhakar Tripathy, a senior police official.

He said 16 bunkers will be removed in Srinagar, summer capital of Kashmir, one of the world's most militarised regions.

But the step may not be enough for Kashmiris who want the revocation of a widely-hated security law that gives the military sweeping powers to search, arrest or shoot protesters .

More than half a million security personnel are deployed in Kashmir, most of which, for years, has been declared "disturbed", a precondition for the application of the Armed Forces Special Powers Act.

The government had also last month said it would review the possibility of limiting the extent of the security act.

"Removal of 10, 15 bunkers is just a cosmetic step, the whole valley is like a military garrison," Mirwaiz Umar Farooq, a senior separatist leader, told Reuters.

"We demand complete withdraw of troops from other towns and unconditional revocation of all draconian laws so that on the ground people will feel a change."

The government has also promised to release jailed protesters and said a team will soon begin a dialogue with a broad cross-section of Kashmiris.

It has also announced the formation of two committees to review the military law.

New Delhi's peace initiative is mostly seen as inadequate by most Kashmiris.

The protests have subsided for about two weeks after a delegation of Indian lawmakers visited Kashmir late last month and talked to local politicians and business groups.

Kashmir is divided between India and Pakistan, both of which claim the region in full. They have fought two of their three wars over the region.

Kashmiri separatists in India want to carve out an independent homeland or merge with predominantly Muslim Pakistan.