"The two men were wearing helmets and raincoats.
They fired indiscriminately at a tourist bus before escaping," K. Singh, a
senior police officer in Delhi, told Reuters.
Six Taiwanese nationals were boarding the bus on a visit
to Jama Masjid when the shooting happened, the vehicle's driver said. The
historic mosque in the old, congested part of the capital is one of Delhi's
most popular tourist attractions.
Police said they detained a young man who owned the
motorcycle used in the shooting. He lives in the Vasant Kunj area of south
Delhi.
An e-mail purportedly from the Indian Mujahideen, a
homegrown militant group, was sent to the BBC just after the attack. The
statement threatened attacks on the Games and criticized India for alleged
oppression in Kashmir.
"We know preparations for the games are at its peak.
Beware we too are preparing in full swing for a great surprise," said the
e-mail, published on the BBC Hindi service website.
Security has been tightened in the capital before the
Games, with authorities mindful of militant attacks in Indian cities over
recent years in which dozens have been killed.
Police would not confirm whether militants were behind
the latest attack. "There was some firing outside Gate No. 3 of Jama Masjid,"
Delhi police spokesman Rajan Bhagat said. "We can't say whether it was a
militant attack. We suspect it is a disgruntled gang of criminals who planned
this attack basically to discredit the Delhi police."
"The claim sent to various media outlets is not
reliable because the attack was carried out in a very unprofessional and crude
manner, which no organized terrorist group would do," a senior policeman
said, requesting anonymity.
Doctors said the condition of the two wounded foreigners
was stable and one of them was undergoing surgery.
Taiwan Foreign Ministry spokesman James Chang said one of
the tourists had suffered a grazed head and the other was wounded in the
abdomen. Neither wound was life-threatening.
The Commonwealth Games, an event organized by the
54-member organization of mainly former British colonies and held every four
years, begin Oct. 3. But the Games threaten to become an embarrassment with the
organizers fighting corruption charges and struggling to get venues ready on
time. The cost of the event has risen more than 17.5 times from the original
estimate and is now put at $6 billion.
"All that I can appeal to everybody is, please do
not panic. An incident like this is something worrying but nothing to panic
about," said Shiela Dikshit, Delhi’s chief minister.
The Commonwealth Games organizers said the Games would go
ahead as planned in a "safe and secure environment."
"The shooting incident this morning in Delhi will
have no impact on the Commonwealth Games," organizing committee
Secretary-General Lalit Bhanot said in a statement.
"The Ministry of Home Affairs and Delhi police have
made elaborate arrangements to provide the Commonwealth Games athletes and
officials a safe and secure environment."
In 2006, at least seven people were injured when two
blasts rocked the same area.
There have been militant attacks in India this year. In
February, an explosion ripped through a restaurant in the western city of Pune,
killing 17 people. The government blamed that attack on Indian Mujahideen.
India is constantly on guard against attacks from
terrorist groups, particularly the Pakistan-based Lashkar-e-Taiba, which New
Delhi blamed for the Mumbai 2008 atrocities and a 2002 attack on the national
Parliament.
Home Minister P. Chidambaram warned last month, however,
that Hindu extremists posed an increasing risk to national security, dubbing
the threat "saffron terror".
