Separatist Is Shot Dead in Kashmir

SRINAGAR, India —  A prominent separatist in Kashmir who sought dialogue with India and opposed violence was shot to death Tuesday in front of 5,000 people at a ceremony here to commemorate another assassinated independence leader.

The slaying of Abdul Ghani Lone, 70, came at a time of increasing tensions between India and Pakistan, nuclear powers that have fought two wars over the divided Himalayan region.

The two countries exchanged heavy fire Tuesday across their border in disputed Kashmir for the fifth day, killing nine people as Indian Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee began a three-day visit to the region, where a raid on an army camp last week stoked tensions.

The two masked men who killed Lone escaped, and there was no immediate claim of responsibility for his death.

The killing came a day after Lone gave a lecture in which he said he was “not averse to talking with India or anyone else, and Kashmir, like any mature political struggle, should be innovative in its strategy.”

The assassination was not the first attack on Lone. He had been attacked last month by a Hindu nationalist and had said that India’s government tried to kill him.

He also had been at odds with other separatists who do not favor dialogue.

Lone’s son blamed his father’s death on neighboring Pakistan and its Inter-Services Intelligence spy agency, which India says has sponsored Islamic militant groups that have crossed into Kashmir and supplanted local separatist groups.

“Pakistan and ISI killed him,” Sajjad Lone told Associated Press Television Network. He gave no explanation.

Pakistan’s Foreign Ministry issued a statement condemning what it called “coldblooded murder” and described the slaying as “yet another incident in the continuing reign of terror unleashed by the occupying forces in Indian-held Kashmir.”

The younger Lone and his father, a leading peace activist, have urged the Pakistani-based Islamic militants who have fought Indian forces in Kashmir for 12 years to give war-shattered residents a chance to find a nonviolent way of expressing their desires for self-government.

The gathering at which the elder Lone was slain was to commemorate the assassination 12 years ago of Kashmir’s highest religious leader, Mohammed Farooq.