A Muslim teenager in England was kidnapped, beaten and threatened with hammers and knives by her brother and sisters after kissing a white man, a court heard yesterday.

The barbarians deny kidnap, actual bodily harm and false imprisonment charges.

The FBI says the number of reported hate crimes dropped significantly in 2009 from the previous year, to their lowest point in more than 15 years, despite the deepening recession and growing social tensions.

Anti-religious crimes also declined, although attacks against Jewish targets continued to far outstrip incidents aimed at Muslims and Islamic sites, David Gibson writes.

The FBI report shows that there were 6,598 single-bias incidents in 2009, with nearly half motivated by racial bias. The second-highest total was the 1,303 incidents motivated by religious bias, accounting for just under 20 percent of all hate crimes.

Overall, the numbers represent a drop of 15 percent in all hate crimes to the lowest number reported since 1994, outstripping the 5.5 percent decline in violent crime in 2009 and the 4.9 percent drop in property crimes.

Mrs Panda and thousands of others like her are victims of the worst communal violence between Hindus and Christians that India has seen for decades.

For a country that boasts of its mutual religious tolerance, the long-simmering tension that has erupted in the Kandhamal district of the state of Orissa – a nun being raped, churches being burned, at least 35 people killed and thousands forced from their villages – is both a belated wake-up call and a mounting embarrassment.

Goths in England have marched in memory of Sophie Lancaster, a young woman who was murdered simply for the way she looked.

She was brutally attacked along with her boyfriend, Robert Maltby, while walking through a park near Manchester almost a year ago. The couple wore gothic fashion and were members of the goth subculture.