Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd warned against vigilante action and called for calm Wednesday after ethnic Indians protested in Sydney and allegedly attacked three men in retaliation for what they say is racially motivated violence.
Recent attacks on Indians, including the stabbing of a student in Melbourne last month, have sparked student-led rallies in Sydney and Melbourne and top-level talks with India over concerns that some of the 90,000 Indian students in Australia are being targeted.
Police say some violence is racially motivated, but much of it is ordinary crime. Some Indian students are vulnerable because they travel alone late at night to part-time jobs or from university carrying valuables such as laptop computers, police say.
"I fully support hard-line measures in response to any act of violence toward any student anywhere _ Indian or otherwise," Rudd told Fairfax Radio in Melbourne.
"We also need to render as completely unacceptable people taking the law into their own hands," he added.
Rudd noted that 20 Australians had been murdered or assaulted in India in the past decade.
"That is not the result of Australians being targeted in India; it's just a fact of violence in the cities around the world," Rudd said. "I do think we need some balance in this debate."
In Sydney, about 70 students chanting "We want justice!" took to the streets Tuesday night to protest recent attacks, including the alleged assault of two Indian men by a group of ethnic Lebanese on Monday. Three Lebanese men were attacked Monday night, apparently in retribution.
Police arrested two men during the protest. One was charged with carrying a weapon.
One protester, Genesh Loke, said he was beaten by an ethnic Lebanese gang on Monday and had his glasses broken. He said police take too long to respond to such crimes.
"If they don't take these matters seriously, then it will keep happening again and again," Loke told Ten Network television news.
Local police chief Supt. Robert Redfern said victims need to make formal complaints.
"Give us statements, give us evidence so that we can make appropriate arrests," Redfern told reporters.
Residents said tensions have grown in Sydney's Harris Park neighborhood as more Indians moved in among a large Lebanese population.
In Melbourne, Victoria state police announced Wednesday that they would increase their presence at some train stations, including officers on horseback and with dogs.
"The message is to reassure the Victorian community that we understand that there is a significant issue here, that we take it seriously," police chief Commissioner Simon Overland said.
Indian students in Melbourne formed groups to escort other Indians home from crime-prone train stations.
One community leader said he saw little evidence of racism.
Vasan Srinivasan, president of the Federation of Indian Associations in Victoria, said attacks on Indian students have increased because their numbers have soared fivefold in Melbourne in five years.
"Most of the incidents are opportunistic _ wrong time at the wrong place. And some students carry cash, and when the offenders see that they've grabbed 3,000 Australian dollars ($2,400) from one student, then the message goes out that the students are cash cows," he said.
Srinivasan saw the escalating student protests as an emotional response to the stabbing of a 25-year-old Indian student with a screwdriver at a Melbourne party last month. He remains in the hospital in intensive care.
Priya Ramesh, who works at a support service for international students in Melbourne, said Indian students did not appear to have any more reason to fear than Chinese.
"If it's racism, why are Indian students the victims? Why aren't middle-aged men getting bashed?" she asked.
