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Kashmir on strike after US sentences accused agent

Published: April 7, 2012 Comment on this article

SRINAGAR, India (AP) — Shops and businesses have been shut in Indian Kashmir during a strike to protest the U.S. prison sentence given to a Kashmir-born man accused of working for Pakistan's spy agency to influence Washington policymakers.

photo - An elderly Kashmiri Muslim woman takes a break during a walk and sits on an auto-rickshaw outside a closed market in central Srinagar, India, Saturday, April 7, 2012. Shops and businesses remained shut on a daylong strike in Indian-controlled Kashmir to protest a U.S. court's decision for sentencing an influential Kashmiri activist to two years in prison. Syed Ghulam Nabi Fai of the Washington-based Kashmiri American Council was found guilty last week for concealing his links to Pakistan's spy agency while he presented himself as an independent voice to members of Congress and successive presidential administrations in the U.S. (AP Photo/ Dar Yasin)

An elderly Kashmiri Muslim woman takes a break during a walk and sits on an auto-rickshaw outside a closed market in central Srinagar, India, Saturday, April 7, 2012. Shops and businesses remained shut on a daylong strike in Indian-controlled Kashmir to protest a U.S. court's decision for sentencing an influential Kashmiri activist to two years in prison. Syed Ghulam Nabi Fai of the Washington-based Kashmiri American Council was found guilty last week for concealing his links to Pakistan's spy agency while he presented himself as an independent voice to members of Congress and successive presidential administrations in the U.S. (AP Photo/ Dar Yasin)

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A court in the state of Virginia sentenced Syed Ghulam Nabi Fai of the Kashmiri American Council to two years in prison on March 30. He admitted he concealed financial links to Pakistan's spy agency while he presented himself as an independent voice on Kashmir's behalf.

Saturday's strike was called by a top Kashmiri separatist leader. Syed Ali Shah Geelani called the U.S. court decision unfortunate and extreme.

Public transport was off the roads and schools were closed in Srinagar, the main city in Kashmir.