Senior separatist leader and Hurriyat Conference (G) chairman Syed Ali Shah Geelani, while speaking at a seminar in Srinagar on March 27, asked J and K Liberation Front chairman Yasin Malik to support his own Safar-e-Azadi (Journey for Freedom) campaign by calling for boycott of elections. Geelani further added that the J and K High Court Bar Association too should rise to the occasion and join the boycott movement so that people would stay away from voting. Gilani added that voting in Kashmir would result in an increase in waywardness, immorality, human rights violations, torture, custodial killings, detentions, among other things1.

In other developments, four security personnel and a top Lashkar-e-Taiba commander were killed in a fierce gun battle in Srinagar on March 232.

• 1. “Geelani calls for Safar-e-Azadi type poll boycott,” Kashmir Times, March 28, 2008, at http://kashmirtimes.com/news2.htm
• 2. “4 security men killed in encounter,” The Hindu, March 25, 2008, at http://www.hindu.com/2008/03/24/stories/2008032457400100.htm