INDIA: Gunmen on motorbikes fired automatic weapons outside the US information and cultural centre in Calcutta yesterday, killing four policemen and injuring 21 others. Several of the injured are in hospital in a critical condition.
No US citizen or centre staff-member was injured, as the building was empty when the armed men struck at 6.35 a.m. The gunmen appeared to be targeting the local police, Indian and US officials said.
The shooting came less than six weeks after a suicide attack on India's parliament for which New Delhi has blamed Pakistani intelligence. Last month's attack - in which 15 people, including five gunmen died - led to a dangerous escalation in military tension in the region.
Officials said yesterday's four attackers, draped in shawls and astride two motorbikes, drove up to the American Centre and opened fire on a policemen outside. The attackers struck when the policemen on night duty were changing guard, fired their assault rifles indiscriminately for four minutes and sped away. The police did not return fire.
The attack, which is the first of its kind in the teeming city, threw rush-hour traffic into chaos, as police sealed off the area around the centre that houses a library, the embassy's public-affairs office, a press section and a cultural wing.
Armed police were deployed to guard the US consulate, barely 500 metres away, bus and railway stations, bridges, reservoirs and other facilities throughout the state.
A high security cordon was also thrown around the US embassy and cultural centre in Delhi and consulates in Bombay and Madras following intelligence reports warning of imminent attacks.
The federal cabinet committee on security headed by the Prime Minister, Mr A.B. Vajpayee, also met in Delhi to discuss the attack.
Delhi's joint police commissioner said there were intelligence reports of a possible strike against US establishments in India, as part of an "unprecedented security threat" ahead of India's Republic Day celebrations on Saturday.
There were several anonymous calls to newspaper offices claiming responsibility for the attack, and the Home Minister, Mr L.K. Advani, said a Dubai-based militant, linked to Pakistan's secret service had called up the Delhi police and said he was behind the shooting.
Pakistan rejected Indian allegations that its intelligence service was involved in the Calcutta attack. Likewise a guerrilla alliance fighting Indian rule in Kashmir said none of its members were involved in the attack.