Carnage. Eight police officers died in a rain of bullets while going to arrest a gangster wanted for murder in a village of the north of India, announced Friday the local authorities. At least seven other people, including a civilian, were injured in the nighttime shooting in a village in the great state of Uttar Pradesh.
The wanted suspect, named Vikas Dubey according to local press, "had the support of the whole village because there was shooting from several roofs," HC Awasthi, Uttar Pradesh police chief, told reporters.
"It was a premeditated attack on the police"
The attackers, who blocked the entrance to the village with a backhoe, appeared to be in possession of semi-automatic weapons, according to Prashant Kumar, another police official. "It was a premeditated attack on the police," he told reporters.
According to the Indian press, the suspect has a long criminal past and is notably suspected of the murder of a political official and minister of Uttar Pradesh in 2001. He is wanted in sixty cases.
His team, estimated at 7 or 8 people, fled the village after the police ambush. A major search operation is underway to find them.
