Indian police have shot dead at least 20 suspected sandalwood smugglers in Andhra Pradesh state in the country's southeast, news reports said.
According to a senior police official, law enforcers opened fire "in self-defense" after clashing with more than 100 suspected smugglers who cut down trees in a remote forest outside the city of Tirupati in the early hours of Tuesday.
"Our police party warned them to hand over the logs. They were accompanied by forest officials as well. But the smugglers refused to hand over the logs," the official was quoted by the AFP agency as saying.
