Dozens injured during protests in Indian Kashmir

SRINAGAR, India — Police fired warning shots in the air and used tear gas and batons to quell thousands of angry protesters across Indian Kashmir on Monday, following the deaths of two young women whom locals claim were raped and murdered by Indian soldiers. More than 100 people, including 15 police officers, were injured in clashes between government forces and protesters in Srinagar, the main city of Indian Kashmir, and several towns in the region, a police officer said on condition of anonymity as he was not authorized to talk to reporters. Police have rejected the protesters' allegations and said the women — whose bodies were found Saturday — appeared to have drowned in a stream. Anti-India sentiment runs deep in Kashmir, and the deaths sparked anger in the disputed, mostly Muslim region. The All Parties Hurriyat Conference, Kashmir's main separatistconglomerate of nonviolent political groups, called for a strike Monday to protest the deaths. Businesses, schools and government offices in Indian Kashmir closed. Chanting "we want freedom" and "produce the killers," the protesters defied police and paramilitary forces who erected steel barricades and strungrazor wire across roads to block them from marching in Srinagar and other places in the Himalayan territory, the officer said. The protesters damaged dozens of vehicles during clashes with police and paramilitary soldiers in the region, the officer said. On Saturday, authorities recovered the bodies of a 17-year-old girl and her 22-year-old sister-in-law in a stream in Shopian, a town 35 miles (60 kilometers) south of Srinagar. Omar Abdullah, Indian Kashmir's top elected official, ordered a judicial probe into the deaths, but said that the initial findings "point in a direction that does not suggest either rape or murder." Rights groups say such probes rarely yield results and are often meant to calm public anger. Javaid Masood, a police officer in Shopian, said police suspect the women drowned, but locals have rejected that theory, and over the weekend angry protesters in the town clashed with government troops, leaving at least 80 people injured. Syed Ali Shah Geelani, a key separatist leader, called for the strikes and protests to continue Tuesday and Wednesday as he denounced the authorities during a Srinagar press conference. Human rights groups and separatist leaders have long accused the Indian military of using rape and sexual molestation to intimidate the local population. Most in Kashmir favor independence from Hindu-majority India or a merger with predominantlyMuslimPakistan. The region is divided between the two nuclear-armed neighbors, and both claim the region in its entirety and have fought two wars over it. Militantseparatist groups have been fighting since 1989 to end Indian rule. More than 68,000 people, most of them civilians, have been killed in the uprising and subsequent Indian crackdown. - AP/