Indian police told to shoot at religious rioters
Thursday, August 28, 2008
INDIAN police were ordered to shoot on sight to end Hindu-Christian clashes yesterday as Pope Benedict XVI "firmly condemned" violence that has killed at least nine people.
Parts of eastern Orissa state have been rocked by Hindu-Christian clashes since Saturday, when a hardline Hindu holy leader and four other people were shot dead by unknown assailants.
"We issued shoot-on-sight orders in the wake of large-scale violence" despite a curfew imposed Monday, said local administrator Satyabrata Sahu.
Mobs armed with sticks went on the rampage, torching government buildings and vehicles and staging other attacks, he said.
Anti-riot forces had rushed to the area 300km (180 miles) southwest of state capital Bhubaneswar but were unable to reach many parts as protesters had "choked access roads with fallen trees," Sahu said by telephone.
Pope Benedict XVI "firmly condemned" the violence in Orissa, where Australian missionary Graham Staines and his two young sons were burnt alive in 1999 - a crime for which a Hindu man is serving life in jail.
The pontiff said he "learnt with great sorrow" about "the violence against the Christian community in Orissa state which broke out after the reprehensible assassination of the Hindu leader Swami Laxmanananda Saraswati."
The death toll from the violence since Saraswati's murder stood at nine, according to figures compiled by the state government.
Among those killed are a Hindu woman working at an orphanage who was burnt to death when the missionary-run facility was torched by a Hindu mob. Originally she was reported to be a nun.
Authorities have refused to reveal the religious identities of the other people killed in the clashes. But a senior police official, who wished to remain unnamed, said the dead included two Christians and two Hindus. National junior home minister Sriprakash Jaiswal, visiting Bhubaneshwar, urged the state government to go on a "war footing" to contain the violence. Hindu-Christian clashes erupt periodically in India where 2.3 per cent of the population are Christians.
AFP
Parts of eastern Orissa state have been rocked by Hindu-Christian clashes since Saturday, when a hardline Hindu holy leader and four other people were shot dead by unknown assailants.
"We issued shoot-on-sight orders in the wake of large-scale violence" despite a curfew imposed Monday, said local administrator Satyabrata Sahu.
Mobs armed with sticks went on the rampage, torching government buildings and vehicles and staging other attacks, he said.
Anti-riot forces had rushed to the area 300km (180 miles) southwest of state capital Bhubaneswar but were unable to reach many parts as protesters had "choked access roads with fallen trees," Sahu said by telephone.
Pope Benedict XVI "firmly condemned" the violence in Orissa, where Australian missionary Graham Staines and his two young sons were burnt alive in 1999 - a crime for which a Hindu man is serving life in jail.
The pontiff said he "learnt with great sorrow" about "the violence against the Christian community in Orissa state which broke out after the reprehensible assassination of the Hindu leader Swami Laxmanananda Saraswati."
The death toll from the violence since Saraswati's murder stood at nine, according to figures compiled by the state government.
Among those killed are a Hindu woman working at an orphanage who was burnt to death when the missionary-run facility was torched by a Hindu mob. Originally she was reported to be a nun.
Authorities have refused to reveal the religious identities of the other people killed in the clashes. But a senior police official, who wished to remain unnamed, said the dead included two Christians and two Hindus. National junior home minister Sriprakash Jaiswal, visiting Bhubaneshwar, urged the state government to go on a "war footing" to contain the violence. Hindu-Christian clashes erupt periodically in India where 2.3 per cent of the population are Christians.
AFP
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