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JAMMU, India, Tuesday (AFP) At least five Muslim civilians and five suspected Islamic militants were killed and three others injured overnight in an ongoing wave of violence which has ravaged Indian Kashmir since a top rebel was gunned down at the weekend, police said Tuesday. In one incident, a group of Islamic militants gunned down a local politician and four others after barging into his house in the Banhihal area of Doda district, 250 kilometres (155 miles) north of Kashmir's winter capital Jammu, late Monday.

The politician, Khadim Hussain, was a member of Indian Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee's Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), a police spokesman said. In another incident, Kashmir police shot dead five suspected militants in Surankote area of the Poonch border district, 210 kilometres (130 miles) west of Jammu, he said.

Three policemen were also injured in the gunbattle which took place late Monday. Kashmir, which is divided between India and Pakistan and claimed in full by both, has been rocked by violence since Indian troops on Saturday gunned down the region's "most wanted" militant, Gazi Baba, in Srinagar, the summer capital.

Meanwhile Indian troops shot dead a Muslim rebel as he attacked a paramilitary camp in Kashmir's main city early on Tuesday, a security official said.

The attack is the latest in a series in the disputed region that have cast a cloud over peace moves between nuclear rivals India and Pakistan, which came close to war over Kashmir last year.

Earlier Indian police charged four Muslims, including a man and wife and their 17-year-old daughter, for the twin car bombings in Bombay a week ago which killed 52 people.

The four were charged under tough anti-terrorism laws which carry the death sentence.

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