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Gujarat violence backed by state, says EU report By Edna Fernandes in New Delhi Published: April 29 2002 18:15 | Last Updated: April 29 2002 18:37 A European Union investigation into India's worst race riots in a decade has concluded that the violence was not spontaneous but a pre-planned policy involving state ministers to "purge" Muslims and destroy their economy, according to an internal report by EU embassies in Delhi. The report provides one of the most damning indictments yet on the Gujarat riots, which have killed almost 900 people, mostly Muslims, in a matter of weeks. One EU source said the report pointed to "ethnic cleansing" of Muslims in the state and that there was clear evidence of complicity by state ministers. The report has been submitted to the 15 EU governments who will decide what action to take and how to raise their concerns at next week's EU-India summit in Delhi. "Gujarat is one of the items on the summit agenda. I imagine we will express concern about everything in our report, including evidence of a purge," said the EU source. If that fails to yield a dialogue, further measures will have to be considered, he said. The disclosure is sure to put further pressure on India's Hindu nationalist BJP-led government, which faces an opposition censure motion in parliament today over its handling of the riots. On Monday Ram Vilas Paswan, the minister for coal, resigned in protest, marking the first formal split in the fragile coalition over the issue. Mr Paswan's Lok Jan Shakti party has four seats in parliament. Atal Behari Vajpayee, prime minister, hit back at foreign criticism last week, accusing the international community of meddling in India's internal affairs. But that position was becoming harder to justify this week amid mounting evidence that the violence was pre-planned and state-backed. Last week some western diplomats described events in Gujarat as "genocide" for the first time. While the EU report stopped short of using that word, it clearly implied there was a policy of ethnic cleansing. "The pattern of violence suggests the purpose was to purge Muslims from Hindu and mixed Hindu/Muslim areas," said a copy of the final draft seen by the Financial Times. "Muslim businesses were systematically targeted and destroyed." On the role of BJP state officials in Gujarat, it said: "Ministers took active part in the violence . . . senior police officers were instructed not to intervene in the rioting." Until now, the BJP central government has said the revenge riots were ignited by a fatal arson attack on a train carrying Hindu activists at Godhra. That attack, which killed 59 people, was blamed on Muslims. But the EU report, based on investigations by a number of individual member states that sent staff to the region, - including Germany, Britain and the Netherlands - said Godhra was no more than a "pretext" for Hindu mob violence, which was planned months before. Diplomatic sources said free swords were being distributed by Hindu activists days before the riots began. The true death toll was put at more than 2,000 and 140,000 people are estimated to be refugees as a result of the attacks. On Tuesday, Human Rights Watch published its own verdict on Gujarat which appeared to back the EU's findings. "What happened in Gujarat was not a spontaneous uprising. It was a carefully orchestrated attack against Muslims," said the group, adding that the state and police were complicit. On Monday, a group of Gujarat victims came to Delhi to tell their stories. Dilawer, a nine-year-old boy, told how his parents were killed. "They spread water. A naked wire was there. My mother died of electric shock. They burned my father also." Another victim, Feeroz Bhai, told how he watched a Hindu mob use a sword to cut out his unborn child from his eight-month pregnant wife, killing them both. --------------------------- ANTI-NATO INFORMATION LIST ==^================================================================ This email was sent to: archive@jab.org EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?a84x2u.a9617B Or send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] T O P I C A -- Register now to manage your mail! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/register ==^================================================================
