Australia charges a man over Indian boy’s death

Gurshan Singh disappeared from a house in Melbourne

Police in Australia’s south-eastern state of Victoria have charged a man with manslaughter in relation to the death of a three-year-old Indian boy.

Dhillon Gursewak, 23, lived in the same house in the Melbourne area where the boy was staying during his holiday. He is not said to be a relative.

He is accused of criminal negligence, Australian media reported.

Gurshan Singh’s body was found on Thursday by the side of a road about 30km (19 miles) away from the house.

His parents had reported him missing.

There have been a number of racist attacks on Indians in the past year.

Australian officials have warned against jumping to conclusions.

Police have been treating the incident as a possible homicide. No cause of death has yet been established and the boy’s body is said to have shown no signs of injury.

Racism charges

Gurshan Singh, who was visiting from Punjab in northern India, disappeared from a house in the north of Melbourne early on Thursday afternoon.

About six hours after his disappearance, a council worker found a body at the side of a road which police said matched the boy’s description.

Attacks on the Indian community have provoked street protests

The boy, whose mother was studying in Australia, had been in the country for about six weeks.

His death came as Australia was making efforts to improve relations with India, a major export market, after a series of alleged race attacks.

The latest known attack was in January when Nitin Garg, 21, was stabbed to death as he walked to work at a burger restaurant.

Australia’s foreign minister had earlier acknowledged that some of the attacks, which prompted street protests last year, were racially motivated.

Earlier, senior officials and police had denied this.

Last month, thousands of Australians visited Indian restaurants for a Vindaloos Against Violence campaign, aimed at showing solidarity with the 450,000-strong community.

Pakistan officers suspended over UK boy kidnap

Four police officers in Pakistan have been suspended over the handling of the kidnap of a five-year-old British boy.

Sahil Saeed, from Oldham, was snatched by armed robbers on Wednesday while visiting relatives with his father.

But the police did not initially respond to the family’s emergency call to “Rescue 15”, the Pakistani equivalent of 999.

Pakistan Interior Minister Rehman Malik met Sahil’s father and said he planned to “make an example of” the captors.

Sahil was taken from his grandmother’s home in the Punjab city of Jhelum as he prepared to take a taxi to the airport for his return flight to the UK.

The attackers are said to have demanded a £100,000 ransom for his return.

‘Pray for him’

On Saturday, Sahil’s mother Akila Naqqas pleaded for his safe return, saying she would forgive his son’s captors if they released him.

Sahil Saeed was taken by robbers after a raid on his grandmother’s home

She also said Sahil had never been apart from either herself or her husband.

“It’s just a nightmare. I’m not sleeping at all,” she said. “It’s worse at night when I have no-one to comfort me.

“All we can do is just pray for him.”

It is understood several men, including a taxi driver, have been arrested in Pakistan.

The interior minister visited Sahil ‘s father Raja Saeed in Jhelum on Sunday.

Mr Malik told him the police believed the kidnappers were people close to the family, and that they were closing in on the culprits.

“We have certain leads that I would not like to discuss,” he said. “But a warning to those abductors – leave the boy because we are very near to you.”

He also said the kidnap was “humiliating” for Pakistan and the captors would be made an “example off”.

Concert cancelled as boy stabbed

Alexander O’Neal had flown in from the US for the Southwark Park concert

A teenage boy has been stabbed in the leg at a festival in London leading to the cancellation of a set by US soul singer Alexander O’Neal.

The day-long event at Southwark Park in Bermondsey was stopped on police advice shortly after 2000 BST just as O’Neal was due on stage.

The boy, who also suffered facial injuries when he was hit with a bottle, was taken to hospital for treatment.

Several thousand people attended the event as part of Bermondsey Carnival.

Dozens of police were quickly on the scene and a number of young people were interviewed.

O’Neal had flown in from the US to attend the free event.

The our correspondent  said there was booing from some sections of the crowd when the decision was announced.

The boy’s condition is not thought to be life-threatening.

Slumdog wins film festival prize

Boyle made his feature film directorial debut with Shallow Grave in 1995

British director Danny Boyle has won the Toronto Film Festival’s main prize for Slumdog Millionaire.

The People’s Choice Award, voted for by film fans, is regarded as an early indicator of success at the Oscars.

The film, starring Dev Patel, charts the life of a poor boy’s rise to fortune living in the Indian slums.

Boyle, 51, received critical acclaim for previous gritty works such as Shallow Grave, Trainspotting and the zombie-horror film 28 Days Later.

Cash prize

Previous winners of the Canadian award include the London gangster film Eastern Promises by acclaimed director David Cronenberg.

It’s a great underdog story Danny Boyle, on Slumdog Millionaire

Patel plays orphan Jamal, who appears on the Indian version of the hit TV game show Who Wants to be a Millionaire.

Originally, Boyle said he had hoped for an all Bollywood cast.

However, that was not possible as local Indian actors “didn’t look enough like losers” for the main role of poor Jamal.

“It’s a great underdog story,” he said.

“In Bollywood if you want to be a young actor breaking into the system, you have to go to the gym for six hours a day to bulk up. I needed a very average-looking guy.”

Bollywood star Anil Kapoor also stars in the movie, along with newcomer Freida Pinto.

Winners of the award are also presented with $15,000 (about £8,400).

US to review Afghan attack case

US forces in Afghanistan are to review an inquiry into an air raid last month after new video evidence emerged indicating scores of civilian deaths.

The US had earlier said that no more than seven civilians died in the attack on the western province of Herat.

However, the Afghan government and the UN said up to 90 people were killed, including many women and children.

The US-based Human Rights Watch (HRW) says such attacks are eroding support for the government and foreign forces.

HRW says civilians deaths from international air strikes nearly tripled between 2006 and 2007.

Disturbing footage

The US general in charge of NATO-led troops (Isaf) in Afghanistan said at the weekend that he was requesting the US military’s Central Command to review the investigation into last month’s air raid.

Gen McKiernan said Isaf realized there was “a large discrepancy between the number of civilian casualties reported by US and Afghan National Army soldiers, and local people”.

The US and Nato need to dramatically improve their co-ordination with each other and with the government of Afghanistan Rachel Reid Human Rights Watch

The US military subsequently said it would “appoint a senior US military officer to review the investigation into the combined Afghan National Army (ANA) and US forces operation”.

A US military statement said: “This review will consider new information that has become available since the completion of the initial investigation.”

Disturbing video footage – apparently of the aftermath of the raid – has been seen by top military figures and diplomats in Kabul.

The shaky footage – possibly shot with a mobile phone – shows some 40 dead bodies lined up under sheets and blankets inside a mosque.

The majority of the dead are children – babies and toddlers, some burned so badly they are barely recognizable.

The covers are removed for the camera one by one: a little girl of perhaps four with brown curly hair; a boy with his eyes still eerily open; another girl with huge injuries on the side of her head.

Villagers say up to 90 civilians died in last month’s attack by US forces

Another boy has his hand up as if to protect his face which was crushed under the rubble.

Clearly heard on the tape is the crying of relatives and the survivors of the bombing raid.

US forces had originally said seven civilians were killed in a “successful” US raid targeting a Taleban commander in Azizabad village in Herat’s Shindand district.

However, the UN, the Afghan government and an Afghan human rights group said the number of civilian deaths was far higher.

Their estimates of the number of civilians killed varied between 76 and 90, with the UN eventually concluding that children accounted for 60 of the dead.

The dispute over the figures had escalated into a fierce behind-the-scenes battle behind the UN and the Pentagon.

Warning over deaths

Meanwhile, Human Rights Watch said in a report released on Monday that decreased reliance on ground forces and greater use of air power was leading to “mistakes” that had “dramatically decreased” support for the Afghan government and international troops.

“Civilian deaths from air strikes act as a recruiting tool for the Taleban and risk fatally undermining the international effort to provide basic security to the people of Afghanistan,” Brad Adams, Asia director of HRW, said in a statement.

Afghan President Hamid Karzai visited Azizabad after the air strike

The group found that in 2007 at least 321 Afghan civilians had been killed in international air strikes – a rise from at least 116 in 2006.

This figure was much lower than the number of civilians killed in militant attacks, the group said. Nearly 950 people were killed by insurgents in 2008, compared with 700 in 2006.

HRW said most of the air strike casualties occurred in unplanned raids, when air power was called to give support to troops on the ground.

“The US and Nato need to dramatically improve their co-ordination with each other and with the government of Afghanistan,” HRW’s Rachel Reid told the BBC.

Afghan President Hamid Karzai has repeatedly warned the US and Nato that civilian deaths undermine his government and damage the reputation of foreign forces in the country.