[Reuters]

Published date: 30th Sep1997

30 September 1997

Reuters News

English

(c) 1997 Reuters Limited

NEW DELHI, Sept 30 (Reuter) – A militant group in Kashmir on Tuesday said an exhumed body was that of the group’s leader and not one of four missing Western hostages as suspected.

The chief of police in India’s Jammu and Kashmir state said forensic experts had reached no conclusions on the identity of the body.

“There is nothing so far (from the tests),” Police Director-General Gurbachan Jagat told Reuters by telephone from Srinagar, the state’s summer capital.

“But they (the experts) have not ruled out the possibility of the body being of one of the Western hostages,” he added.

Harkat-ul Ansar, a Pakistan-based guerrilla group Indian authorities believe is linked to the kidnappings, said In a statement issued in Srinagar that the exhumed body was of a Harkat commander, Zia-ud-Din.

“The examination of the body shows the frustration of the Indian security forces. Such acts of the Indian security forces boost the morale of the militants. India is under tremendous pressure from the Western world to trace the whereabouts of the hostages and is now trying to mislead the world through such acts,” the statement said.

Indian authorities believe the Harkat group is allied with shadowy Al-Faran guerrillas who kidnapped the Western tourists in July 1995. Harkat denies any ties with Al-Faran.

Harkat is one of about a dozen militant Moslem groups fighting for Kashmir’s independence or merger with neighbouring Pakistan.

Asked how long it might take for forensic experts to reach a conclusion, Jagat said: “About another week.” He added that the experts, who examined the body in Srinagar on Monday, might take DNA samples to the eastern city of Calcutta for more tests.

DNA stands for deoxyribonucleic acid, which is present in the chromosomes of all plant and animal cells and carries instructions for the passing on of hereditary characteristics.

Police exhumed the body last Thursday from a grave in Akingam village in Kashmir’s Anantnag valley.

A captured militant said during interrogation that it was the body of one of the hostages kidnapped in the area in July 1995.

But residents of Akingam told journalists the body was that of Zia-ud-Din, a militant who died in a gun battle with Indian paramilitary troops 21 months ago.

On July 4, 1995, Americans Donald Hutchings and John Childs and Britons Paul Wells and Keith Mangan were kidnapped by Al-Faran militants while trekking in the Himalayas near Anantnag, which is about 50 km (33 miles) south of Srinagar.

Four days later, Childs escaped. On the same day, the captors abducted German Dirk Hasert and Norwegian Hans Christian Ostroe. Ostroe was found beheaded in August 1995.

Several captured militants have told interrogators that they believe the hostages were shot dead and buried in a south Kashmir forest.

Indian authorities and experts from the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation and Scotland Yard have scoured the area but have come up with no clues.

“We don’t know if the hostages are dead or alive,” a U.S. diplomat said on Monday. “We retain the hope that they are alive but it is looking bleak in many ways.”

(c) Reuters Limited 1997