INDIA: Indian commandos shot dead two teenage Muslim gunmen in a Hindu temple complex in western Gujarat state early yesterday morning. It followed an overnight gunfight that ended the bloody siege in which 27 devotees died.
The suicide attack on the Akshardham temple in Gujarat's capital Gandhinagar, 450 miles west of New Delhi, renewed fears of a fresh round of Hindu-Muslim violence across Gujarat and heightened tension with nuclear rival Pakistan, whom India blames for the attack. Over one million Indian and Pakistani soldiers are locked in a standoff along their common frontier, following a similar suicide attack by gunmen on India's parliament last December for which Delhi holds Islamabad responsible.
The Indian government yesterday ordered military reinforcements to be sent to the region for fear of further communal violence.
Three security personnel also died in the 15-hour exchange of fire with the gunmen. Another 74 people, including 23 police and National Security Guard commandos were injured, some seriously. The Prime Minister, Mr Atal Behari Vajpayee, who arrived at Gandhinagar last evening said terrorism would be "decisively defeated".
"This is not a matter of politics but of national unity and integrity and affects us all," he said in a passionate speech in which he obliquely blamed Pakistan for the assault, but refrained from naming it. He also appealed for communal harmony in Gujarat, which was rocked by sectarian killings for several weeks earlier this year.
Police said the attackers carried letters in their pockets in Urdu - a language used by Muslims in South Asia - with the name of a previously unknown group, Tehrik-e-Kasas (Movement of Revenge). The letters stated their desire to wreak vengeance on Hindus for the pogrom of Muslims which began in February and ended around May.
"We are trying to find out more about this organisation," said India's Deputy Prime Minister, Mr Lal Krishna Advani. He too blamed Pakistan for the attack, but stopped short of naming it.
"Our enemies carried out the attack after they realised democracy was prevailing in Kashmir," Mr Advani said, referring to the ongoing polls in the war-torn Himalayan state that have been relatively trouble-free. India blames Pakistan for fuelling Kashmir's 13-year old insurgency, which has claimed over 35,000 lives. The Pakistan President, Mr Pervez Musharraf, promised in May to stem cross-border militant infiltration, but India says it is continuing.
According to Akshardham temple priest Bharma Vihari, the two gunmen burst into the complex on Tuesday evening and threw grenades at devotees and sprayed them with automatic gunfire. They tried storming the temple's main complex, but a guard locked the heavy wooden doors. The gunmen then took up positions on the terrace on one side of the temple, from where they fired down on those below.
Police and paramilitary personnel rescued hundreds of people by using other entrances into the complex. The elite National Security Guard "Black Cat" commandos, who were flown in from Delhi, deployed around the complex and at 5.00 a.m. around 100 of them mounted a fierce attack. Two hours later the gunmen lay dead.