India did not act fast enough in Gujarat

Released on Wednesday by the State Department's Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labour, the report notes that "... the Government generally respects this right in practice. However, the government sometimes in the recent past did not act swiftly enough to counter societal attacks against religious minorities and attempts by some leaders of state and local governments to limit religious freedom."

Washington reiterated its displeasure with the pace of bringing about justice in the Gujarat riots of 2002 that killed nearly 2,000 people in Gujarat, most of them Muslims.

"Despite the Government's efforts to foster communal harmony, some extremists continued to view ineffective investigation and prosecution of attacks on religious minorities as a signal that they could commit such violence with impunity, although numerous cases are currently in the courts," says the report, which contains chapters on numerous countries throughout the world.

The report details the steps taken by the Manmohan Singh coalition government to address the failures of the government of Gujarat to halt expeditiously Hindu-Muslim riots there in 2002.