Aus PM's nephew terms attacks on Indians as racially motivated

Toeing a line different from that of Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd, his firebrand nephew Van Thanh Rudd has said the attacks on Indian students in his country were "racially motivated".

Toeing a line different from that of Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd, his firebrand nephew Van Thanh Rudd has said the attacks on Indian students in his country were "racially motivated".

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"These attacks on Indians are racially motivated, I have no doubt in my mind about that. Australians are racist," he said in an interview to weekly magazine Outlook.

35-year-old Rudd, leader of the Revolutionary Socialist Party, had created a stir on January 26, the Australian national day, when he walked into the Melbourne Park wearing the infamous Klu Klux Klan outfit to protest attacks on Indian students. He was fined 234 Australian dollars by the Victorian police.

Asked whether racism was limited among certain sections, he said, "It is more widespread than we want to accept. There is a culture of racism that comes from our schools, our education system. As a son of a Vietnamese mother, I too experienced racial abuse in school."

Terming the decision to allow foreign students to study in Australia as a "marriage of convenience", Rudd said, "you need the students because you earn the revenue, and you need a lot of your work to be done by them. But you also want to treat them as refugees. You discriminate against them."