Freight train loaded with oil attack

Police in India today said that a powerful explosion has derailed a freight train, setting more than a dozen oil tanks on fire in the country's insurgency-wracked north east.

Officials say there were no casualties in last night’s attack, which is being blamed on the United Liberation Front of Asom, a separatist group fighting for an independent state.

An oil refinery spokesman today said the train was transporting diesel and petrol in tanks from a state-owned refinery in Numaligarh, nearly 155 miles (250 kilometres) east of Gauhati, the Assam state capital.