World | India
India deploys more police following fresh religious clashes
The government deployed hundreds more federal police to eastern India on Friday after one person was killed and several injured in fresh clashes between Hindus and Christians triggered by religious conversions.
- Agencies
- Published: 10:09 September 26, 2008
Bhubaneswar: The government deployed hundreds more federal police to eastern India on Friday after one person was killed and several injured in fresh clashes between Hindus and Christians triggered by religious conversions.
More than 700 federal police are being sent to Orissa state after the death in rural Kandhamal district following clashes between Christians and Hindus on Thursday. Several houses were also set on fire.
The violence came after a string of attacks on Christians in three Indian states that has left at least 20 people dead and dozens of churches damaged in the last month. Christians have responded with some violence in Orissa state.
More than 3,000 federal police have already been deployed in the region. Violence first erupted in Orissa after the killing of a Hindu leader linked to the main opposition Hindu-nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and four others last month.
"We have moved seven more companies of paramilitary forces to the troubled areas," Orissa's inspector general of police in charge of law and order, Pradeep Kapur, said.
The attacks on Christians in India have been condemned by Pope Benedict and Roman Catholic bishops have urged the European Union to treat persecution of Christians as a humanitarian emergency.
But violence has continued, especially in Kandhamal where thousands of Christians now live in government camps because their homes are destroyed or they are too fearful to return.
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