India's insurgency-racked north-east was reeling Sunday from one of its deadliest waves of violence in years, as police reported more killings that brought the weekend death toll to 59 with 205 injured.
A string of bloody blasts and shootouts in adjoining Assam and Nagaland states on Saturday killed at least 44 people. Overnight another five victims died in hospital while 10 others were killed in fresh violence Sunday, police said.
In New York, UN Secretary General Kofi Annan strongly condemned the bombings and shootings, saying he had learnt of the violence with "shock and dismay."
It also coincided with the 18th anniversary of the founding of the National Democratic Front of Bodoland (NDFB), one of around 30 rebel groups fighting for greater autonomy or independence in the region.
Police blamed the attacks on the NDFB and other rebel groups.
India's Home Minister Shivraj Patil who arrived in Nagaland Sunday on a fact-finding mission after a brief stopover in Assam, said the government would take "very strong steps" to deal with militancy.
"We will have to find a long term solution to bring about an end to insurgency in region," he said before visiting some of the injured in hospital as attacks continued through the day.
Fifteen people were wounded when rebels lobbed a grenade at shoppers in northern Assam's Sonitpur district, 180 kilometres (112 miles) from the main city Guwahati, a police spokesman said. One of the injured later died in hospital. Another 20 people were injured in two blasts in Gossaigaon and Baska areas of western Assam, he added.
Three people were killed and 30 injured Sunday evening by a powerful explosion in a crowded market in western Bijny town, a police spokesman said.
Around the same time, another blast ripped through a market in western Goripur in Dhubri district, killing two people and wounding 15.
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