Gunmen slay 24 in Hindu village in section of Kashmir

NADIMARG, India -- Suspected Islamic militants in Indian army uniforms dragged 24 Hindus from their homes, lined them up outside a temple and shot them to death Monday in a remote village in Indian-controlled Kashmir.

It was the biggest ever terrorist attack on Hindus in the Muslim-majority state on India's northernmost tip.

A group of about eight to 10 armed men pulled the villagers -- upper-caste Hindus known as Kashmiri Pandits -- out of their homes in Nadimarg in the disputed Himalayan province and shot them at close range, police and witnesses said. The dead included two children. Others in the village managed to escape, police officer M.A. Anjum said.

"Around midnight a group of men in army uniform banged on our doors and dragged us outside," said Ramesh Kumar, a villager who escaped.

No one claimed responsibility for the attack.

Indian police said they believed the gunmen were Islamic militants, who have been fighting for Kashmir's independence from mainly Hindu India, or a merger with Islamic Pakistan, since 1989.

A cease-fire line divides Kashmir between the two countries, both of which claim the whole Himalayan territory, which has a population of some 10 million.

The massacre posed another threat to India's already tense relations with its nuclear rival Pakistan, although Islamabad condemned the violence against civilians. The hostile neighbors came to the brink of a fourth war after the Indian government blamed Pakistan for similar attacks a year ago.

Syed Salahuddin, chief of the Hezb-ul Mujahedeen militant group in Pakistan's part of Kashmir, expressed grief over the massacre of civilians and blamed the Indian security forces and spy agencies for the attack.

"Indian security forces and their spy agencies have been involved in such killings in the past as well to defame the valiant and just struggle of the Kashmiri freedom fighters," he said in a statement.

India accuses Pakistan of training and arming the Islamic groups, a charge Islamabad denies.

Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee met with his top security advisers in New Delhi and decided to send Deputy Prime Minister Lal Krishna Advani to the site of the attack on Tuesday, External Affairs Minister Yashwant Sinha told reporters.

The United States joined Pakistan and Britain in condemning the attack, which occurred 30 miles south of Srinagar, the summer capital of India's portion of Kashmir.

The main separatist alliance, All Parties Hurriyat Conference, in Indian-held Kashmir also called for a general strike on Tuesday to protest the massacre of civilians.

Kashmiri Pandits, who have lived in the region for centuries, have often been the target of attacks by suspected Islamic militants causing tens of thousands of them to flee. At least 23 people were killed in a 1998 raid on another Hindu village.

Many live in refugee camps in other Indian cities.

The state government has been making efforts to bring them back to their homes, and Girish Chandra Saxena, the governor of Indian-controlled Kashmir, said Monday's attack was aimed at preventing that.

The U.S. Ambassador to India, Robert Blackwill, condemned "the ghastly murder of innocent men, women and children."

"The global war on terrorism will not be won until such atrocities end against all countries," Blackwill said in a statement.

The Pakistan Foreign Ministry in a statement said: "This blatant act of terrorism, reportedly carried out by persons wearing Indian army uniforms, is reprehensible."

British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw spoke to his Indian counterpart Sinha by phone, expressing his shock and offering condolences to the bereaved families.

The massacre occurred a day after unidentified gunmen assassinated an Islamic guerrilla leader who was forced out of Kashmir's main rebel group after reportedly holding secret talks with the Indian government.

Hours after Monday's attack, hundreds of Hindu refugees living in camps in Jammu -- the state's winter capital -- held a street protest, accusing the government of failing to protect them.

In an unrelated incident, Indian security forces killed three suspected Islamic militants in a gunbattle Monday in Phatan, a village 70 kilometers (45 miles) south of Srinagar, police said.

Two of three wars between Pakistan and India since independence in 1947 fought over Kashmir.