[India] More than 70 die in train crash

[Colm Moore]

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/...breaking3.html

More than 70 die in train crash

Maoist rebels sabotaged a high-speed train in eastern India today, killing at least 71 people, a top Indian police official said.

At least 200 people were injured and the death toll could rise as rescuers continue to free passengers trapped in the wreckage.

"This has been done by the Maoists," Bhupinder Singh, police chief of West Bengal state where the incident occurred, told reporters. Singh said the Maoists had claimed responsibility.

A blast hit the passenger train forcing it into the path of a speeding goods train coming from the opposite direction in eastern India early this morning, a railway spokesman said.

Air force helicopters were evacuating the injured.

The passenger train was going to Mumbai from the eastern metropolis of Kolkata in West Bengal state.

The incident occurred in the state's Jhargram area.

"The blast derailed 13 coaches of the Gyaneshwari Express. These coaches then fell on the other track where a goods train rammed into some of them," Soumitra Majumdar, a railway spokesman said.

"We fear many casualties. There could be many people dead. We don't have details yet."

The spokesman said sabotage was suspected because the passenger train had been hit by a blast.

The Maoist rebels, who often attack police, government buildings and infrastructure such as railway stations, have in recent months stepped up attacks in response to a government security offensive to clear them out of their jungle bases.

The rebels blew up a bus in the mineral-rich state of Chhattisgarh this month, killing 35 people, about a month after 76 police were killed in another attack.

Prime minister Manmohan Singh has described the insurgency as India's biggest internal security challenge.

The decades-old movement is now present in a third of the country and while they have made few inroads into cities, they have spread into rural pockets of up to 28 states and hurt potential business worth billions of dollars.

Reuters