44 Indian Soldiers trapped by IED near Sri Nagar

At least 44 Indian paramilitary soldiers were killed on Thursday in occupied Kashmir in the deadliest attack on security forces since 2002, police said.
The attack, surpassing one in 2016 when 19 soldiers died, saw explosives packed inside a van rip through buses in a convoy of 78 vehicles carrying some 2,500 members of the paramilitary Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF).
Two blue buses carrying around 35 people each bore the brunt of the explosion around 20 kilometres from the main city of Srinagar on the main highway towards Jammu.
The Press Trust of India (PTI) news agency reported that at least 44 people were dead, while other press reports said the number could exceed 40.
Some of the bodies were so badly blown up that officials feel it may take some time to identity them, PTI reported. The convoy was bringing the troopers back from leave to rejoin active service.
It was unclear whether the van containing the explosives was driven into the convoy or whether it was detonated when the buses were adjacent.
“It was a powerful explosion. The explosive was car-borne,” CRPF spokesman Sanjay Kumar told AFP.
Photos showed the blackened, mangled remains of at least one vehicle littered across the highway.
Unconfirmed photos showed the charred remains of at least one vehicle littered across the highway as black smoke billowed upwards.
Reports said that there were 350 kilos of explosives used.
Meanwhile, The Hindu reported the toll as 44 soldiers killed and four injured.
The blast took place in the Lethpora area of south Kashmir's Pulwama on Thursday afternoon and Jaish-e-Mohammad (JeM) has claimed responsibility, saying it was a suicide attack, according to the publication.
"A convoy in which the soldiers were travelling was attacked by a JeM suicide bomber, who rammed his explosives-laden vehicle into one of the convoy’s buses," reported The Hindu.
According to The Hindu, he was identified as Adil Ahmad Dar alias ‘Waqas Commando’, a resident of Pulwama’s Kakapora.
After the attack, hundreds of government forces cordoned around 15 villages in the district the bomber came from and started searching house-to-house, a police officer and witnesses said.
India has an estimated 500,000 soldiers in Kashmir, which has been divided between India and Pakistan and riven by unrest since the end of British rule in 1947.
Kashmiris have been fighting for an independent Kashmir, or a merger with Pakistan, since 1989.
New Delhi accuses Pakistan of fuelling the uprising that has left tens of thousands of civilians dead. Islamabad denies the charge, saying it only provides diplomatic support to Kashmiris' right to self-determination.
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