New anti-Indian attack despite Australian crackdown
Agence France-Presse | 07/01/2009 7:43 PM
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MELBOURNE - An Indian student Wednesday told how youths tore off his turban and tried to hack off his hair in Australia's latest apparent race attack, which came despite an official crackdown on hate crimes.
Resham Singh said six youths racially taunted him and even threatened to kill him during the unprovoked attack at a Melbourne train station, continuing a wave of attacks which have prompted angry street demonstrations.
"They were saying, 'you Indians, we hate you, we will kill you,'" the 22-year-old hospitality student told ABC radio.
The attack in the suburb of Dandenong came just weeks after police announced a blitz against race crime in Melbourne's train stations, where Indian students have increasingly been the target of robberies and assaults.
The violence has led to protests by students in Melbourne and Sydney last month and also sparked outrage on the sub-continent, straining Canberra's diplomatic ties with New Delhi.
The issue, seen as damaging Australia's image and hitting its universities' lucrative line in offering courses to foreign students, is one of the major talking points at a meeting of the country's top leaders this week.
At the talks in Darwin, Prime Minister Kevin Rudd and state officials will discuss ways of stopping the violence and reassuring India that its students are safe.
"We don't want the only view of Australia to be some terrible and tragic incidents, which we have condemned," Foreign Minister Stephen Smith told Sky News.
"We are, generally, a safe society. We welcome not just Indian students, but all students from other countries."
Authorities have played down any racial aspect to the attacks and described them as opportunistic crimes, although Smith conceded there were indications ethnicity was a factor in some assaults.
Singh, who was left with cuts and bruises, was in no doubt that the latest attack was racist, saying the insult to his Sikh religion by ripping off his turban and cutting his hair was worse than the beating he suffered.
"They pulled off my turban, I can't tolerate this thing," he said. "We can tolerate violence physically but we can't tolerate these things."
Police arrested two teenagers over the attack and charged them with assault and causing injury. A police statement on the case does not indicate that it is being treated as a hate crime.
Singh said he had seen no evidence of an increased security presence despite promises that uniformed police, mounted officers, dog handlers and helicopters would help keep Melbourne's train stations safe.
"How can we stay here? I can't feel safe here... I have never seen police here (at the train station)," he said.
Around 95,000 students from India are studying in Australia after a university publicity blitz targeting the huge Asian country's growing middle class.
Many have complained about being targeted by gangs. The issue came to a head in late May when student Sravan Kumar Theerthala was left comatose after being stabbed with a screwdriver during an attack in Melbourne.
Theerthala had emerged from his coma and was undergoing rehabilitation, Federation of Indian Students of Australia president Amit Menghani said.
"He's out of danger but is having some problems with his sight and can't remember things too well," Menghani told AFP.
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