New Delhi (AsiaNews/Agencies) - Mohammed Afzal Guru, an Indian Kashmiri who plotted to attack India's parliament in 2001, was hanged this morning. On 23 January, President Pranab Mukherjee had turned down his wife's final clemency plea, setting off the countdown for his execution. The sentence was carried out at Tihar jail near Delhi and his body was buried in the prison's cemetery.
According to Indian authorities, Afzal Guru, a fruit vendor by trade, was a member of Jaish-e-Mohammed, a Pakistan-backed group that advocates Kashmir's independence.
On 13 December 2001, a group of terrorists entered India's parliament, and killed a gardener and eight police officers, before they were shot dead. Azful was accused of supplying them with the weapons they used.
India's Supreme Court rejected the appeal against his conviction in 2004. Scheduled for October 2006, the execution was stayed after his wife made a special plea for clemency.
Although included in the Indian Penal Code, executions are very rare in India. Afzal Guru's was only the second since 2004, after Mohammed Ajmal Kasab, the sole surviving attacker from the 2008 Mumbai attack, was executed in November last year.