Terrorist killed in Kashmir encounter, US-made rifle recovered

Shopian : A US-made M4 carbine rifle was recovered from the terrorist of the Lashkar-e-Taiba killed in an encounter in Jammu and Kashmir’s Shopian district on Sunday, officials said.Police said based on specific input regarding presence of terrorists in village Rawalpora of Shopian, a joint cordon and search operation was launched by the police, the army and the CRPF on Saturday.During the search operation, the presence of terrorists was ascertained and they were given opportunity to surrender, but instead fired indiscriminately upon the joint search party, which retaliated, leading to the gunfight, a police official said.Due to darkness, the operation was suspended but the cordon remained intact throughout night.Police said on Sunday morning, repeated announcements were again made appealing to the hiding terrorists to surrender but they fired on the joint search party which retaliated. So far one terrorist identified as Jahangir Ahmad Wani, son of Abdul Rehman Wani and resident of Rakh Narapora Shopian, affiliated with proscribed terror outfit LeT was killed.Police further added that as per police records, the killed terrorist was active since September 2020 and was involved in several terror crime cases including attacks on security forces and civilian atrocities.”Arms and ammunition including USA made M4 Carbine rifle and other incriminating materials were recovered from the site of encounter so far. All the recovered materials have been taken into case records for further investigation and to probe his complicity in other terror crimes,” police said.”During the encounter, three houses caught fire while as a group of miscreants tried to disrupt the operation and created law and order problem near the encounter site during which some miscreants were also injured. However, to track the other hiding terrorists, cordon and search operation in the area is still on.”