Rebels kill 56 in northeast India

GUWAHATI: At least 56 people, including children, died in a series of militant attacks in Assam, Indian police said yesterday, as the rebels dramatically intensified a long-running separatist campaign in the tea-growing state.
Witnesses said armed militants pulled villagers from their homes and shot them at point-blank range in a series of coordinated attacks carried out across the remote and volatile northeastern state on Tuesday.
Assam, which borders Bhutan and Bangladesh, has a long history of often violent land disputes between the indigenous Bodo people, Muslim settlers from Bangladesh and rival tribes in the area.
"This is one of the most barbaric attacks in recent times, with the militants not even sparing infants," Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi said, adding that the culprits would not be spared.
Police said 12 children were among those killed in the attacks, which they blamed on the outlawed National Democratic Front of Bodoland (NDFB).
The group has for decades waged a violent campaign for a separate homeland for the people of the Bodo tribes, which are indigenous to India's northeast.
"As of now, 56 people are dead and 80 others are injured. At least 20 of them are in critical condition in hospitals," police Inspector-General S. N. Singh said.
"Our teams are still trying to reach the remote areas to see if there are more bodies lying in houses or forests."
A curfew has been imposed in sensitive areas and the army is on standby, Singh said.
One villager said the rebels were armed with sophisticated assault rifles and had come on foot.
"I saw my wife and two sons being shot dead before my eyes," said Anil Murmu, a 40-year-old survivor from the worst-hit village of Phulbari, where 30 people were killed.
"I somehow managed to escape by hiding under the bed," he said.
India's Prime Minister Narendra Modi condemned the attacks as an "act of cowardice" and said the federal home minister would travel to Assam to assess the situation.
Police said recent talks initiated by the national government with one faction of NDFB may have provoked the attacks. Some hardliners within the group opposed negotiations. – AFP