Kashmir unrest: Rajnath Singh chairs high-level meeting

Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh on 16 August, chaired a high-level meeting at the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) to discuss the present situation in violence-hit Jammu and Kashmir.

National Security Adviser Ajit Doval, the Home Secretary and the Director of the Intelligence Bureau were also present at the meeting. The meeting comes in the wake of cross-border infiltration attempts in Kashmir on Independence Day in which a CRPF jawan was killed.

It also comes a day after Pakistani Foreign Secretary Aizaz Ahmad Chaudhry invited his Indian counterpart, S Jai Shankar, to visit Islamabad for a dialogue on Kashmir even as New Delhi had last week rejected Foreign Affairs Adviser to Pakistani Prime Minister Sartaj Aziz's statement that his country had planned to invite the Indian Foreign Secretary for peace talks on Kashmir.

Meanwhile, five more protesters were killed by the security forces in central Kashmir's Budgam district today on 16 August, taking the death toll in the valley to 64.

Curfew and separatist shutdown continued in Kashmir for the 39th consecutive day on Tuesday.

-ANI