Assam family massacred

By Subir Bhaumik in Calcutta

At least six members of a family in India's north-eastern state of Assam have been shot dead in an attack being blamed on separatist rebels.

Six heavily-armed men broke into the family's home at Bihubara village, near Assam's border with the neighbouring state of Nagaland.

When they could not find their intended target, a Marwari trader, the rebels opened indiscriminate fire, killing six people - three of them children.

No-one has admitted the attack so far, but police say the banned United Liberation Front of Assam (ULFA), which has been active in the area, was behind the killings.

The attack, on the home of Rabheysham Aggrawal, also left a number of people injured.

Propaganda leaflets

Family sources say two more of the family have died in hospital.

The ULFA has denied involvement in similar killings in recent months, in which more than 30 people from the states of Rajasthan and Bihar have been killed in various parts of Assam.

The killers left behind propaganda leaflets of the Assam Tiger Force, a group about which very little is known.

Police say the Assam Tiger Force is a front for the ULFA, but the rebels say the group has been created by an Indian secret agency to discredit them.

The killings follow the shooting dead of a tea planter in Assam on Thursday.

Tea planters fear

Suspected rebels on motorbikes shot and killed the manager of the privately-run Fatemabad tea estate in western Barpeta district, some 200km (64 miles) from the state capital of Guwahati.

The attack was blamed on the National Democratic Front of Bodoland.

In the past four years, at least 20 planters have been killed and more than 50 tea executives kidnapped by militants for ransom in Assam.

Separatist groups are active in many parts of north-east India, with many fighting for the establishment of independent homelands.