India extends Kashmir curfew to stop separatist rally

By Sheikh Mushtaq

SRINAGAR (Reuters) - Troops in Kashmir used metal barricades and barbed wire to seal off residential areas and extended a curfew on Monday across the region, effectively thwarting a planned pro-separatist rally.

Tens of thousands of policemen and soldiers in riot gear patrolled deserted streets in the Himalayan region and used loudspeakers to warn residents to stay indoors.

Over the past two months Kashmir has seen some of the biggest anti-India demonstrations since a separatist revolt against New Delhi's rule broke out in the region in 1989.

About 40 protesters have been shot dead by security forces and hundreds injured in past two months.

Separatists had planned a huge anti-India rally in Lal Chowk (Red Square), the historic centre of Kashmir's summer capital, Srinagar, where six decades ago India's first prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru promised a referendum on self-determination.

"We condemn use of force and appeal to people to continue peaceful protests against Indian occupation," said Mirwaiz Umar Farooq, chairman of region's main separatist alliance, the All Parties Hurriyat (freedom) Conference.

Farooq has been placed under house arrest since Sunday and Yasin Malik, another senior separatist leader who has led a series of anti-India demonstrations in the past two months, was detained by police on Saturday night.

The protests have become an embarrassment for the government but subsided for few weeks during the Muslim holy fasting month of Ramadan which ended on Sept. 30.