Mr. Terrorist -- Please Take A Break
Mr. Terrorist -- Please Take A Break
Please?
nytimes.com/2008/11/27/world/asia/27mumbai.html?em=&pagewanted=print
NEW DELHI — Coordinated terror attacks struck the heart of Mumbai, India’s commercial capital, Wednesday night, killing dozens in machine-gun and grenade assaults on
show more...
at least two five-star hotels, the city’s largest train station, a movie theater and a hospital.
Mumbai police said the attacks killed at least 75 people and wounded 240, according to preliminary reports. There were also reports that hostages had been taken at at least one of the hotels, with Americans and British nationals being singled out.
Gunfire and explosions rang out well into the night, and hours after the assaults began parts of the landmark Taj hotel, next to the iconic Gateway of India, were in flames. Fire also raged inside the posh Oberoi Hotel, according to police.
Several high-ranking law enforcement officials, including the chief of the anti-terror squad and a commissioner of police, were reported killed. The military was quickly called in to assist the police.
Even by the standards of terrorism in India, which has suffered a rising number of terrorist attacks this year, these assaults were particularly brazen and dramatically different in their scale and execution. Instead of anonymously planted bombs, as in the previous attacks, the assailants on Wendesday night were spectacularly well-armed and confrontational.
Vilasrao Deshmukh, the chief minister for Maharashtra state, where Mumbai is located, told the private CNN-IBN station that the attacks hit five to seven targets, concentrated in the southern tip of the city, known as Colaba and Nariman Point.
In some cases, the state’s highest ranking police official, A.N. Roy, said the attackers opened fire and disappeared. The Indian home minister, Shivraj Patil, said that two suspected attackers had also been killed.
Around midnight, more than two hours into the serial attacks began, television images from near the historic Metro Cinema showed journalists and spectators ducking for cover as gunshots rang out.
Television footage showed the charred shell of a car in front of Victoria Terminus railway station. A nearby gas station was blown up. The landmark Leopold’s Café, a favorite tourist haunt, was also hit.
Around 1 a.m., two guests trapped inside the Taj hotel, next to the iconic Gateway of India, said by telephone that they heard a fresh explosion and gunfire in the old wing of the hotel.
A 31-year-old man who was inside the Taj attending a friend’s wedding reception said he was getting a drink around 9:45 p.m. when he heard something like firecrackers — “loud bursts” interspersed with what then sounded like machine gun fire.
A window of the banquet hall shattered, guests scattered under tables, and they were quickly escorted to another room in the hotel, he said. No one was allowed to leave. Just before 1 a.m., another loud explosion rang out and then another about a half hour later, said the man inside the Taj.
His friend, the groom, was two floors above him, in the old wing of the hotel, trapped in a room with his wife. One of the explosions, he said by telephone, took the door off its hinges. He blocked it with a table. Then came another, and gunfire rang out throughout the evening.
A British businessman, Rakesh Patel, who escaped the Taj, told a local television station that two young men armed with a rifle and a machine gun took 15 people hostage, forcing them to the hotel roof. The gunmen, dressed in jeans and t-shirts, “were saying they wanted anyone with British or American passports,” he said.
He and four others managed to slip away in the confusion and smoke of the upper floors, he said. He said he did not know the fate of the remaining hostages.
At the Oberoi, where Indian Army soldiers arrived at shortly after 2 a.m., guests were also apparently trapped. Among them, The Times of India reported, were top executives and board members of Hindustan Unilever, the corporate multinational giant.In Washington, the State Department immediately condemned the attacks but said there were no immediate reports of American casualties.
Reuters reported that a European official was among the wounded. “My hotel is surrounded by police and there are gunmen inside,” a European lawmaker, Ignasi Guardans, told Spanish radio from the Taj Hotel, according to Reuters. “We are in contact with some deputies inside the hotel, with one in a room and another hidden in the kitchen. There’s another official hurt and in hospital.”
India has been ripped by a succession of terror attacks over the last several months. Many of them were initially blamed on Islamist militants, although in recent weeks, police have pointed to a Hindu terror network as well, making several arrests.
Mumbai, or Bombay as it is also known, has suffered several spectacular terror attacks in recent years. In 1993, a suspected Muslim organized crime network bombed the stock exchange, trains, hotels and gas stations, apparently in retaliation for Muslim deaths in religious clashes the year before. Those bombings killed more than 250 and injured more than 1,000.
In 2003, 52 people were killed in another set of bombings blamed on Muslim militants. In July 2007, a series of bombs planted inside commuter trains killed 187 people.
Mumbai police said the attacks killed at least 75 people and wounded 240, according to preliminary reports. There were also reports that hostages had been taken at at least one of the hotels, with Americans and British nationals being singled out.
Gunfire and explosions rang out well into the night, and hours after the assaults began parts of the landmark Taj hotel, next to the iconic Gateway of India, were in flames. Fire also raged inside the posh Oberoi Hotel, according to police.
Several high-ranking law enforcement officials, including the chief of the anti-terror squad and a commissioner of police, were reported killed. The military was quickly called in to assist the police.
Even by the standards of terrorism in India, which has suffered a rising number of terrorist attacks this year, these assaults were particularly brazen and dramatically different in their scale and execution. Instead of anonymously planted bombs, as in the previous attacks, the assailants on Wendesday night were spectacularly well-armed and confrontational.
Vilasrao Deshmukh, the chief minister for Maharashtra state, where Mumbai is located, told the private CNN-IBN station that the attacks hit five to seven targets, concentrated in the southern tip of the city, known as Colaba and Nariman Point.
In some cases, the state’s highest ranking police official, A.N. Roy, said the attackers opened fire and disappeared. The Indian home minister, Shivraj Patil, said that two suspected attackers had also been killed.
Around midnight, more than two hours into the serial attacks began, television images from near the historic Metro Cinema showed journalists and spectators ducking for cover as gunshots rang out.
Television footage showed the charred shell of a car in front of Victoria Terminus railway station. A nearby gas station was blown up. The landmark Leopold’s Café, a favorite tourist haunt, was also hit.
Around 1 a.m., two guests trapped inside the Taj hotel, next to the iconic Gateway of India, said by telephone that they heard a fresh explosion and gunfire in the old wing of the hotel.
A 31-year-old man who was inside the Taj attending a friend’s wedding reception said he was getting a drink around 9:45 p.m. when he heard something like firecrackers — “loud bursts” interspersed with what then sounded like machine gun fire.
A window of the banquet hall shattered, guests scattered under tables, and they were quickly escorted to another room in the hotel, he said. No one was allowed to leave. Just before 1 a.m., another loud explosion rang out and then another about a half hour later, said the man inside the Taj.
His friend, the groom, was two floors above him, in the old wing of the hotel, trapped in a room with his wife. One of the explosions, he said by telephone, took the door off its hinges. He blocked it with a table. Then came another, and gunfire rang out throughout the evening.
A British businessman, Rakesh Patel, who escaped the Taj, told a local television station that two young men armed with a rifle and a machine gun took 15 people hostage, forcing them to the hotel roof. The gunmen, dressed in jeans and t-shirts, “were saying they wanted anyone with British or American passports,” he said.
He and four others managed to slip away in the confusion and smoke of the upper floors, he said. He said he did not know the fate of the remaining hostages.
At the Oberoi, where Indian Army soldiers arrived at shortly after 2 a.m., guests were also apparently trapped. Among them, The Times of India reported, were top executives and board members of Hindustan Unilever, the corporate multinational giant.In Washington, the State Department immediately condemned the attacks but said there were no immediate reports of American casualties.
Reuters reported that a European official was among the wounded. “My hotel is surrounded by police and there are gunmen inside,” a European lawmaker, Ignasi Guardans, told Spanish radio from the Taj Hotel, according to Reuters. “We are in contact with some deputies inside the hotel, with one in a room and another hidden in the kitchen. There’s another official hurt and in hospital.”
India has been ripped by a succession of terror attacks over the last several months. Many of them were initially blamed on Islamist militants, although in recent weeks, police have pointed to a Hindu terror network as well, making several arrests.
Mumbai, or Bombay as it is also known, has suffered several spectacular terror attacks in recent years. In 1993, a suspected Muslim organized crime network bombed the stock exchange, trains, hotels and gas stations, apparently in retaliation for Muslim deaths in religious clashes the year before. Those bombings killed more than 250 and injured more than 1,000.
In 2003, 52 people were killed in another set of bombings blamed on Muslim militants. In July 2007, a series of bombs planted inside commuter trains killed 187 people.
Cast: Matthew Milam
show less...
Tags:
barack
barackobama
cnn
cnn,
death
death,
destruction
destruction,
enough
enough,
enoughisenough
goverment
goverment,
house,
india
india,
matthewmilam
matthewmilam,
mumbai
mumbai,
nytimes
nytimes,
obama,
politics
politics,
terrorism
terrorism,
thanksgiving
thanksgiving,
vlomo08
white
whitehouse
