Five persons, including three militants and two securitymen, were killed in a nightlong encounter in the foothill village of Hayan, 42 km from Srinagar in north Kashmir.

A senior police officer told rediff.com on Wednesday that on a specific information, troops of 24 Rashtriya Rifles and special operations group of the state police surrounded Hayan village on Tuesday evening and mounted a massive search operation.

"Troops of Rashtriya Rifles (RR) and SOG were quickly moved to cordon the two residential houses were the militants had been hiding. The holed up militants tossed grenades and fired from their automatics on the surrounding troops. One army soldier and one member of SOG died in the heavy firing," the officer said.

The troops later engaged the holed up militants in a fierce gunbattle, which ended early this morning with the killing of three militants. Two residential houses were destroyed in the exchange of fire.

Senior police and security force officers have rushed to the spot.