Gunmen in Indian-Illegally Occupied Jammu and Kashmir raked a construction site work camp with bullets, killing seven people and wounding several others, Indian media reported on Monday, updating an earlier toll.
The attack on Sunday is one of the worst this year targeting civilians. The contested territory's chief minister, Omar Abdullah, called the attack late Sunday "dastardly and cowardly", while India's interior minister Amit Shah vowed those responsible would face the "harshest" response.
Attackers targeted workers from outside the Himalayan region, who were reported to be building a road tunnel connecting IIO with the far northern Ladakh region, bordering China.
Abdullah, who was sworn in as the region's chief minister on Wednesday after its first local elections for a decade, said he strongly condemned the attack on "non-local labourers".
Soon after the attack, Abdullah confirmed two people had been killed but had warned there were also "a number of injured labourers, both local and non-local".
The Press Trust of India (PTI) news agency also reported Monday that a doctor was among the seven killed. Security forces scoured the mountain terrain Monday trying to track down the attackers.
India's home minister Amit Shah called the killings "a despicable act of cowardice" in a statement.
"Those involved in this heinous act will not be spared, and will face the harshest response from our security forces," Shah said.
Gunmen fired automatic weapons at the camp from forested hills around, Indian newspapers reported.
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi's government cancelled the limited autonomy enjoyed by the disputed territory in 2019, accompanied by mass arrests and a months-long communications blackout.
His administration says the decision has allowed it to stem the insurgency, but critics have accused it of suppressing political freedoms.
Kashmir's governor, a post appointed by New Delhi, vowed retribution as he visited some of those wounded in the attack in hospital on Monday
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