NEW DELHI: Eight people were arrested in India on Saturday for the murder of a politician who championed the rights of lower-caste Indians, police said.
K. Armstrong, the state boss of the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP), was hacked to death with machetes and sickles near his home in the southern city of Chennai on Friday night.
Six men traveling on motorbikes attacked Armstrong while he was “chatting with friends and supporters” near his home in the Tamil Nadu state capital, the Indian Express newspaper reported.
The men reportedly escaped before anyone could intervene.
Several of Armstrong’s supporters took to the streets later in the evening to protest his assassination and demand justice.
Senior Chennai police officer Asra Garg said eight suspects were being interrogated after a “preliminary investigation.”
Mayawati, the national head of Armstrong’s BSP, who uses one name, said the attack was “highly deplorable and condemnable.”
“The state government must punish the guilty,” she said in a post on social media platform X.
Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M.K. Stalin also urged police to speedily conclude the investigation.
“Armstrong’s assassination is shocking and deeply saddening,” he said.
8 arrested after gruesome murder of Indian politician
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8 arrested after gruesome murder of Indian politician
Russia hits Ukraine with drones, missiles, kills at least 10 in Kharkiv
- Zelensky said that Russia launched 480 drones and 29 missiles targeting the energy sector and railway infrastructure
- “There should be a response from partners to these savage strikes against life“
KHARKIV, Ukraine: Russia launched a barrage of drones and missiles at Ukraine overnight on Saturday, damaging infrastructure and killing at least 10 people, including two children, in the northeast city of Kharkiv, Ukrainian officials said.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said that Russia launched 480 drones and 29 missiles targeting the energy sector and railway infrastructure across the country.
“There should be a response from partners to these savage strikes against life,” Zelensky said on the Telegram app.
“Russia has not abandoned its attempts to destroy Ukraine’s residential and critical infrastructure, and therefore support should continue,” Zelensky said, urging partners to continue air defense and weapons supplies.
Ukrainian air defense units shot down 453 drones and 19 missiles, the air force said. But nine missiles and 26 attack drones hit 22 sites, it said.
BALLISTIC MISSILE SLAMS INTO RESIDENTIAL BUILDING
The city of Kharkiv was targeted by both Russian drones and missiles, and 10 people, including two children, were killed after a Russian ballistic missile slammed into a five-story residential building, Kharkiv mayor Ihor Terekhov said.
“When we arrived here 20 minutes after the explosion, I thought I was going to have a stroke. I couldn’t string two words together, and my legs were buckling,” Hanna, a resident of the destroyed building, told Reuters.
“It’s good that I wasn’t there with my child and that my father was with me. It was ordinary people who lived there. What were they targeting?“
Russia’s Defense Ministry said its forces carried out massive overnight strikes on Ukrainian military-industrial complexes, military airfields and energy facilities, the Interfax news agency reported.
In Kharkiv, 15 people were also wounded, and 19 residential buildings were damaged by the Russian attacks, Syniehubov said.
Commercial and administrative buildings, electricity distribution lines, and cars were also hit, he said.
In Kyiv, three people were injured, and the heating was knocked out in 2,806 residential apartment buildings in four districts across the capital after Russian strikes hit an energy infrastructure facility, Prime Minister Yulia Svyrydenko said.
National grid operator Ukrenergo said that emergency power cuts were introduced in seven regions following the Russian attacks.
Ukrainian officials said that Russia also attacked four railway stations and other railway infrastructure in central Ukraine and port infrastructure in the southern Odesa region, setting on fire containers with vegetable oil and damaging a grain warehouse.
