Hundreds of protesters clashed with riot police in Indian Kashmir on Tuesday after the brother of a rebel leader was killed by government forces.

While authorities in the disputed region said Khalid Wani was shot dead in a gun battle with Indian troops in a forest, his father said the 24-year-old had been tortured to death. 

Maoist rebels triggered a powerful landmine blast in India's restive Chhattisgarh state on Monday, killing four policemen in the third attack in the region in as many days.

Eight other policemen were wounded in the blast, which was carried out in remote Dantewada district, and were being airlifted to state capital Raipur, a senior officer told AFP.

Indian Kashmir's main city of Srinagar shut down Saturday in protest against a government plan to resettle Kashmiri Hindus in separate townships after they fled the region more than two decades ago.

Streets were deserted, shops and business establishments remained closed and traffic was thin on the roads in the capital city and other towns across the restive Muslim-majority Kashmir valley.

A Tibetan nun is believed to have died after setting herself on fire to protest China's rule over the Himalayan region and to voice support for the Dalai Lama, rights groups and media said.

Yeshi Khando walked around the Kardze Monastery in a type of prayer that is common in Tibetan Buddhism, and then set herself alight on Wednesday near the Ganzi county police station, the British-based Free Tibet group, the International Campaign for Tibet (ICT) and U.S.-funded Radio Free Asia (RFA) said.

India's prime minister announced Friday that New Delhi had ordered 36 Rafale fighter jets from France in a multi-billion-euro agreement that has been years in the making.

Standing alongside his counterpart Francois Hollande on a visit to France -- the first leg of his maiden trip to Europe -- Narendra Modi finally relieved the frantic speculation over whether tortuous, years-long negotiations on buying the jets would ever bear fruit.

The United States on Friday denounced the decision by Pakistani authorities to free the alleged mastermind of the 2008 Mumbai attacks, Zaki-ur-Rehman Lakhvi, on bail.

State Department spokesman Jeff Rathke said Washington was "gravely concerned" and had "communicated that concern to senior Pakistani officials over the course of many months and as recently as yesterday."

Pakistani authorities have freed the alleged mastermind of the 2008 Mumbai attacks on bail, sources said Friday, a move that swiftly drew furious condemnation from India.

Zaki-ur-Rehman Lakhvi, accused over the terror siege that left 166 dead, was released late on Thursday, according to an official at Adiyala Prison in Rawalpindi, next to Islamabad.

A court in Bangladesh's north Wednesday sentenced two Indian insurgents to life in prison for using Bangladeshi territory to carry out militant attacks across the border in Assam, a prosecutor said.

Ranjan Chowdhury, alias Major Ranjan, and Prodip Marak were sentenced in a district court in the town of Kishoreganj amid tight security over their roles in a separatist movement in neighboring India's northeast Assam state.

Police in a northern Indian city said Tuesday they have a new weapon for controlling unruly protesters in the world's largest democracy: pepper-spraying drones.

Yashasvi Yadav, police chief of Lucknow, said his officers have successfully test-flown the newly purchased drones with a view to better crowd control. 

At least 20 people were killed when police opened fire Tuesday on loggers who attacked them with axes and stones in an area of southern India known for sandalwood smuggling.

Deputy Inspector General M. Kantha Rao said his officers had opened fire "in self-defense" after challenging a group of over 100 suspected smugglers in a remote forest in the southern state of Andhra Pradesh.