More than 50 Maoist insurgents attacked a police station in India's impoverished Bihar state, killing two policemen and blowing up the building with dynamite.
Two policemen were also seriously wounded in the attack last night at Chabilapur, near Patna, the capital of the eastern state.
The Maoists took weapons abandoned by the officers.
Maoist guerrillas, who operate in at least eight Indian states, say they are fighting for the rights of poor peasants and landless labourers in the country's rural hinterland and regularly ambush police patrols and set off explosions.
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New Delhi says Indian Maoists have links with Maoist rebels in Nepal fighting to topple that nation's monarchy.