http://www.smh.com.au/news/world/stone-age-tribe-kills-fishermen/2006/02/08/1139379571616.html
Stone Age tribe kills fishermen
By Peter Foster in New Delhi
February 9, 2006
ONE of the world's last Stone Age tribes has murdered two fishermen
whose boat drifted on to a desert island in the Indian Ocean.
The Sentinelese, thought to number between 50 and 200, have rebuffed all
contact with the modern world, firing a shower of arrows at anyone who
comes within range.
They are believed to be the last pre-Neolithic tribe in the world to
remain isolated and appear to have survived the 2004 Asian tsunami.
The men killed, Sunder Raj, 48, and Pandit Tiwari, 52, were fishing
illegally for mud crabs off North Sentinel Island, a speck of land in
the Andaman and Nicobar Islands archipelago.
Fellow fishermen said they dropped anchor for the night on January 25
but fell into a deep sleep, probably helped by large amounts of alcohol.
During the night their anchor, a rock tied to a rope, failed to hold
their open-topped boat against the currents and they drifted towards the
island.
"As day broke, fellow fishermen say they tried to shout at the men and
warn them they were in danger," said Samir Acharya, the head of the
Society for Andaman and Nicobar Ecology, an environmental organisation.
"However they did not respond - they were probably drunk - and the boat
drifted into the shallows where they were attacked and killed."
The Indian coast guard tried to recover the bodies using a helicopter
but was met by a hail of arrows.
Photographs shot from the helicopter show the near-naked tribesmen
rushing to fire. But the downdraught from its rotors exposed the two
fishermen buried in shallow graves and not roasted and eaten, as local
rumour suggested.
Attempts to recover the bodies have been suspended, although the Andaman
Islands police chief, Dharmendra Kumar, said an operation might be
mounted later.
Environmental groups urged the authorities to leave the bodies and
respect the five-kilometre exclusion zone thrown around the island. In
the 1980s and early 1990s many Sentinelese were killed in skirmishes
with armed salvage operators who visited the island after a shipwreck.
Since then the tribesmen have remained virtually undisturbed.
Telegraph, London
/end
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Fundies and trolls are cordially invited to
shove a wooden cross up their arses and rotate
at a high rate of speed. I trust you'll
be 'blessed' with a cornucopia of splinters.
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