Indian Kashmir explosion kills 28

At least 28 people were killed in disputed Kashmir yesterday when a bus packed with Indian soldiers and their families ran over a landmine planted by separatist guerillas, officials said.

The attack, which came one day after Prime Minister Manmohan Singh took office, was the deadliest in Kashmir since India and Pakistan began a peace process late last year to resolve the dispute over the territory, the cause of two of their three wars.

Torn limbs, blood-stained shoes and clothes and lunch-boxes with rice and bread lay strewn on the highway at Lowermunda, 100 kilometres south of Srinagar, Kashmir's summer capital.

The bus - part of a convoy going from Srinagar to Jammu, the state's winter capital - was left a twisted mass of metal near a giant crater on the highway carved through Himalayan foothills.

Soldiers and sniffer dogs combed the area for more mines. A senior police official, K. Srinivasan, said 19 Border Security Force troopers, three children and six women were killed in the blast. Mr Singh, who took office on Saturday, said his government remained committed to a peaceful resolution of all disputes.

"I have learned with the deepest sorrow about the latest cowardly act of terrorists in Jammu and Kashmir... The persistence of this senseless violence in Jammu and Kashmir is yet another indication that terrorism continues to pose a grave threat to our nation's integrity and progress," he said in a statement.

"While we will continue to seek peaceful resolutions to all outstanding problems, there can be no compromise on our solemn resolve to deal with the menace of terrorism with firm determination."

Mr Singh has vowed to carry forward the nascent peace process begun last year by former Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee and Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf.

The blast took place near the Pir Panjal mountains, a favoured hideout for Islamic militants fighting Indian rule in Kashmir, where tens of thousands of people have died in 15 years of rebellion.