WASHINGTON, Jan 14: India has so far failed to protect marginalized castes and religious minorities, Human Rights Watch said in its annual report released on Thursday.

However, the Human Rights Watch gave a mixed review of the rights situation in India. It praised the new coalition government for repealing the "oft-abused" Prevention of Terrorism Act and conducting a re-evaluation of educational policies that fostered communitarian resentments. But it also ticked off the Congress party-led government, which replaced the Bharatiya Janata Party, for allegedly using other legislation to shield security forces from accountability.

The rights group said the Indian military, paramilitary, and police forces had engaged in serious human rights abuses not just in conflict-zones such as occupied Kashmir, but also when dealing with criminal suspects and detainees.

The group also blamed the Indian government for its "systematic failure" to protect the rights of marginalized castes and religious minorities. Human Rights Watch also highlighted the AIDS problem in India and the society's discrimination against victims.

In Nepal, it said a brutal eight-year civil war between Maoist rebels and government forces had a devastating impact on the desperately poor rural population. Human Rights watch documented widespread abuses by both sides last year.

In Sri Lanka, it said the most pressing rights issue continued to derive from the country's two-decades-old civil war. It accused the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam of stepping up forcible recruitment of children despite agreeing to an action plan in 2003 to release children from its forces back into the community as well as into transit centres.

SUDAN: The report termed the rights situation in Sudan's Darfur region as the worst atrocity along with Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison scandal. The HRW said Sudanese government officials responsible for the slaughter in Darfur should be held accountable and prosecuted.