Charging the Gujarat government with sabotaging the investigation into the post-Godhra violence, a human rights body has urged the Centre take over the probe into the large scale killings.

"The ring leaders of massacres committed in 2002 are still roaming in Gujarat and the Gujarat massacre cases have been sabotaged," Human Rights Watch charged in a new report released in Washington on Monday.

Lawyers representing Muslim victims and doctors providing medical help to them have also faced harassment and threats, the HRW report alleged.

HRW urged the Centre to take over the probe into the post-Godhra killings saying the state government had 'sabotaged investigations'.

"Thirty-five of the 73 witnesses reportedly retracted in court the statements they had given to the police identifying the attackers," the report said referring to the recent acquittals in the Best Bakery case.

"The government's record on the massacres is appalling. Sixteen months after the beginning of the violence, not a single person has been convicted," Smita Narula, senior researcher and author of the HRW report said.

The Gujarat Violence: Complete Coverage
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