July 23, 2002	Tuesday	Jamadi-ul-Awwal 12,1423

NEW DELHI, July 22: Human rights group Amnesty International said on Monday that New Delhi had effectively refused its delegates access to the state of Gujarat, where they wanted to investigate recent massacres and other human rights violations.

The Indian government had failed to issue visas by a deadline of July 12 as agreed with its representatives in London, the group said in a statement.

“Amnesty International believes that the refusal of the Indian government to grant access to the state will only reinforce the concerns that the government of Gujarat and the state police might have been accomplices in allowing (the violence) to occur, and could be now attempting to cover up involvement of their officials.”

Gujarat witnessed India’s worst communal clashes in a decade in February, when around 1,000 people, mostly Muslims, were killed.

The riots were triggered by a mob — alleged to be Muslim — torching a train carrying Hindu activists at Gujarat’s Godhra town on February 27, which killed 58 people.

The worst of the clashes were brought under control after New Delhi ordered troops to take charge of law and order in the state on March 1, although sporadic violence continued for some weeks.

Nearly 27,000 people, most of them Muslims, are still living in relief camps in Ahmedabad.

Indian rights activists have accused the government of complicity in the riots, with police allegedly turning a blind or even sympathetic eye to reprisal attacks on Muslims.—AFP