Quake deals blow to rebels

SRINAGAR, India – The massive earthquake that rocked Kashmir appears to have dealt a blow to the disputed region’s Islamic militants, ripping through their heartland along the mountainous frontier and wrecking their network of camps, safe houses and weapons caches.

One former militant said Tuesday that a temporary rebel cease-fire called after the quake was a “clear sign they are in trouble.”

But he and other one-time rebels, Western diplomats and Indian officials cautioned that any setback to the insurgents – who work in small, flexible cells – is likely to be merely temporary.

And even if they can’t launch major attacks, the surviving rebels in Indian Kashmir would press their fight, most agreed, citing scattered violence in recent days.

“Their struggle runs deep and is strong felt,” said Shahid ul-Islam, the former militant and a former lawyer who now leads a nonviolent separatist group.

Dozens of militant groups have been fighting since 1989 for Kashmir’s independence from India or its merger with Pakistan, a conflict that has killed more than 66,000 people. The Himalayan territory is divided between India and Pakistan by a cease-fire line known as the Line of Control that has become a de facto militarized border.

While U.S. officials have said that outlawed Pakistani extremists groups in Kashmir may be hiding al-Qaida leaders and training its foot soldiers, Pakistani leaders say no link between Osama bin Laden’s terror network and the militants has been established.

The 7.6-magnitude quake devastated villages and towns on both sides of the frontier in Kashmir, an area of towering peaks and deep valleys that has for the past 16 years offered plentiful hide-outs from which the rebels launch attacks.

Hundreds of militants were believed to be among the dead, including top commanders from the feared Lashkar-e-Tayyaba group, some officials said.

“Shelter must be a problem, rations must be a problem, weapons must be a problem,” said Mohammed Ashraf, a former militant. “In the short term, they will not be nearly as sure-footed as they were before.”

On the Pakistani side of Kashmir, where many of the militants are believed to have camps, the devastation was exponentially greater.

Indian security officials, who asked not to be identified because of the sensitivity of the matter, said intelligence reports indicated that between 300 and 400 militants were killed in at least three ruined training camps around Muzaffarabad – Pakistani Kashmir’s main city – and the town of Rawalakote, also hit hard.