Paramilitary commandos in central India yesterday launched an operation to flush out a group of Maoist rebels who killed 26 police officers in a jungle ambush.
“The security forces have entered the jungle on a manhunt for the outlawed Maoist commanders and rebels,” said Ram Niwas, the head of anti-Maoist operations in Chhattisgarh state.
Tuesday’s ambush was the third major rebel attack on security personnel in Chhattisgarh in as many months.
The police officers were returning from a road-opening ceremony when they were ambushed by as many as 100 Maoist fighters who opened fire with automatic weapons from a hilltop, officials said.
A total of 26 officers were killed in a three-hour gun battle.
The government launched a major offensive last year to tackle the worsening left-wing insurgency, but since then the Maoists have hit back — triggering widespread criticism of officials and politicians.
The offensive saw more than 60,000 paramilitary police and state police pushed into the worst-affected states along with extra funds for modernizing the forces and development packages.
Maoist rebels have fought for decades throughout east and central India against state and government rule, drawing support from landless tribal groups and farmers left behind by the country’s economic development.
The Maoists had massacred 76 policemen in Chhattisgarh in a similar assault in April, and in May a Maoist landmine attack on a bus killed 24 civilians and 11 police.
Maoist saboteurs in West Bengal were also blamed for derailing a Mumbai-bound passenger train from Calcutta in May, killing nearly 150 people.
The scale of recent rebel strikes has highlighted the government’s struggle to find an effective strategy against the insurgency, leading to calls for the army and air force to be drafted in.
Until now, the government has insisted that paramilitary and state police forces are capable of thwarting the Maoists.
However, Indian Home Minister P. Chidambaram recently acknowledged that policy changes were needed and said he would request wider powers.
Chidambaram said that the chief ministers of some of the worst-hit states had asked for air strikes against the rebels — a measure the military is reluctant to endorse.
Archeologists in Peru on Thursday said they found the 5,000-year-old remains of a noblewoman at the sacred city of Caral, revealing the important role played by women in the oldest center of civilization in the Americas. “What has been discovered corresponds to a woman who apparently had elevated status, an elite woman,” archeologist David Palomino said. The mummy was found in Aspero, a sacred site within the city of Caral that was a garbage dump for more than 30 years until becoming an archeological site in the 1990s. Palomino said the carefully preserved remains, dating to 3,000BC, contained skin, part of the
‘WATER WARFARE’: A Pakistani official called India’s suspension of a 65-year-old treaty on the sharing of waters from the Indus River ‘a cowardly, illegal move’ Pakistan yesterday canceled visas for Indian nationals, closed its airspace for all Indian-owned or operated airlines, and suspended all trade with India, including to and from any third country. The retaliatory measures follow India’s decision to suspend visas for Pakistani nationals in the aftermath of a deadly attack by shooters in Kashmir that killed 26 people, mostly tourists. The rare attack on civilians shocked and outraged India and prompted calls for action against their country’s archenemy, Pakistan. New Delhi did not publicly produce evidence connecting the attack to its neighbor, but said it had “cross-border” links to Pakistan. Pakistan denied any connection to
TRUMP EFFECT: The win capped one of the most dramatic turnarounds in Canadian political history after the Conservatives had led the Liberals by more than 20 points Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney yesterday pledged to win US President Donald Trump’s trade war after winning Canada’s election and leading his Liberal Party to another term in power. Following a campaign dominated by Trump’s tariffs and annexation threats, Carney promised to chart “a new path forward” in a world “fundamentally changed” by a US that is newly hostile to free trade. “We are over the shock of the American betrayal, but we should never forget the lessons,” said Carney, who led the central banks of Canada and the UK before entering politics earlier this year. “We will win this trade war and
Armed with 4,000 eggs and a truckload of sugar and cream, French pastry chefs on Wednesday completed a 121.8m-long strawberry cake that they have claimed is the world’s longest ever made. Youssef El Gatou brought together 20 chefs to make the 1.2 tonne masterpiece that took a week to complete and was set out on tables in an ice rink in the Paris suburb town of Argenteuil for residents to inspect. The effort overtook a 100.48m-long strawberry cake made in the Italian town of San Mauro Torinese in 2019. El Gatou’s cake also used 350kg of strawberries, 150kg of sugar and 415kg of