Foreign Desk Report
WASHINGTON: A US government commission faulted India’s response to deadly communal riots in New Delhi and urged the government to take swift action to protect the Muslim minority.
The US Commission on International Religious Freedom, which advises the US government but does not set policy, voiced “grave concern” about the violence which broke out as President Donald Trump was visiting.
“One of the essential duties of any responsible government is to provide protection and physical security for its citizens, regardless of faith,” said chairman Tony Perkins, a conservative Christian close to the Trump administration. “We urge the Indian government to take serious efforts to protect Muslims and others targeted by mob violence,” he said in a statement. Anurima Bhargava, a commissioner appointed by Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, voiced alarm at reports that Delhi police “have not intervened in violent attacks against Muslims.”
“The brutal and unchecked violence growing across Delhi cannot continue,” she said. “The Indian government must take swift action to ensure the safety of all of its citizens,” she added.
The clashes in Delhi, which have left at least 27 people dead, were triggered by protests against a citizenship law seen by critics as anti-Muslim and part of Modi’s Hindu nationalist agenda. Modi has called for calm, although witnesses said police did little to stop Hindu mobs. The commission also plans a public hearing next week on how citizenship laws, including in India and Myanmar, are used to target religious minorities.
Meanwhile, Chief US diplomat for South Asian affairs, Alice Wells, in a mildly worded statement on Thursday urged those behind the recent communal unrest in India’s capital to “refrain from violence”. In a tweet, she said: “Our hearts go out to the families of the deceased and injured in New Delhi. We echo PM @NarendraModi’s call for calm and normalcy and urge all parties to maintain peace, refrain from violence, and respect the right of peaceful assembly.”
Protests against a contentious citizenship law began on a smaller scale on Sunday but escalated on Monday as US President Donald Trump started his two-day trip to India and Tuesday into running battles between Hindus and Muslims in New Delhi’s north-east, where rioters armed with stones, swords and even guns were out in force. Sporadic violence hit parts of Delhi overnight as gangs roamed streets littered with the debris of days of communal riots that have killed 32 people, police said on Thursday.
India accuses US commission of politicising violence Wells’ remarks come after India on Thursday accused a US government commission of politicising communal violence in New Delhi that killed at least 32 people and injured more than 200. On Wednesday, the US Commission on International Religious Freedom said it was deeply troubled by the violence and cited accounts that police had not intervened in attacks against Muslims, which police and India’s federal government have denied.
