SRINAGAR // Police and paramilitary soldiers used batons and fired tear gas to disperse hundreds of Muslims participating in religious processions in the Indian portion of Kashmir.
Authorities imposed a curfew in parts of Srinagar, the region’s main city, to prevent gatherings marking Moharram to develop into anti-India protests yesterday.
Officers said scuffles erupted when police and paramilitary forces tried to stop the marchers. They said some marchers chanting religious slogans retaliated by hurling stones at the soldiers.
Police detained at least a dozen people, but no one was reported injured.
Large gatherings have been banned in Indian-administered Kashmir since an armed insurgency broke out in 1989 to achieve the region’s independence from India or its merger with neighbouring Pakistan.
* Associated Press
