Seven killed in Assam bomb blast

Police blamed the blast on separatists

At least seven people were killed when a bomb exploded in the north-eastern Indian state of Assam, police said.

Another 18 people were injured in the blast, which happened in the main city of Guwahati.

Police said that the bomb was hidden in a three-wheeled auto-rickshaw parked in a crowded market area of the city.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility but police said they blamed separatist rebels of the United Liberation Front of Assam (Ulfa).

"We had intelligence inputs of Ulfa targeting the city's crowded areas, a day ahead of celebrations to mark the state government's first year in power," Reuters news agency quoted a police official as saying.

The BBC's Subir Bhaumik said the bomb had been placed in an auto rickshaw alongside a gas cylinder to maximize the impact of the explosion.

He said doctors had warned the number of dead could rise because many of the wounded were critically injured.

Our correspondent says another device was found in a railway station in the western part of the state.

Diversionary attacks

Ulfa is fighting one of India's longest-running insurgencies to establish an independent homeland in Assam.

The rebels accuse New Delhi of exploiting the state's natural resources while neglecting its people, who are ethnically closer to the people of Burma and China than to the rest of India.

Assam police chief R N Mathur told the BBC that Ulfa was attacking Hindi-speaking migrants and bombing areas where they resided in an attempt to divert security forces from offensive operations.

Talks between the rebels and the Indian government broke down last September after a brief truce.

More than 20 people have been killed in a string of explosions across Assam in the last two weeks.