By Fayaz Bukhari
SRINAGAR (Reuters) – Hundreds of protesters blocked a section of a main highway that runs through the Indian border region of Jammu and Kashmir on Friday over the killing of two men who worked as labourers at an Indian army base, a police official and residents said.
Residents said the men were shot dead earlier on Friday by army guards at the entrance of the base in Rajouri, 150 km (95 miles) south of Kashmir’s capital Srinigar.
The Indian military said the two men were killed by militants outside the military hospital in Rajouri.
Protesters burned tyres and pelted the military base with stones hours after the shooting, said the police official, who declined to be named as he was not authorised to speak to the media. Another man was also injured.
The mainly Muslim Himalayan region of Kashmir is claimed in full by both India and rival Pakistan, although both nuclear-armed neighbours only control parts of the region.
In 2019, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government split the state of Jammu and Kashmir (J&K) into two federally administered territories, a widely unpopular decision which has heightened violence in the region.
(Reporting by Fayaz Bukhari; Writing by Miral Fahmy; Editing by Raissa Kasolowsky)
