Actress Amla among Greenpeace activists held in Hyderabad

Actress Amala Nagarjuna was

today arrested along with nine others, including Greenpeace

activists, for staging a protest near historic Charminar

demanding halting of new coal mining projects in forest areas,

police said.Amala and other activists were arrested under section

151 CrPC (arrest to prevent commission of cognisable offence)

by the Charminar Police and later released on personal bonds,

a senior police officer said.On a day when Environment Minister Jayanthi Natarajan

inaugurated the eleventh meet of the Conference of the Parties

(COP-11) to the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) here,

Amala and some Greenpeace activists unfurled a banner, painted

with the message 'Stop Coal Crimes--Save Indian Forests' from

the monument seeking suspension of further mining in

identified forest areas.The activists demanded that the government stop all

new coal mining activity in forest areas, according to a

release from the Environmental NGO."Coal mining is destroying the huge biodiversity in

India besides homes of tribal communities and threatening

natural habitat of Indian Tiger and that is why I am

protesting today along with those who signed Greenpeace

India's petition demanding the government to stop destroying

our forests," Amla said.The 44-year-old actress cum animal welfare activist

has acted in a number of Tamil, Telugu, Kannada, Malayalam and

Hindi films.On Amla's arrest, Divya Raghunandan from Greenpeace

said, "the present policy of the Indian government will fell

over 1.1 million hectares of pristine forest, displace tens of

thousands of indigenous people and wreck the rich biodiversity

of India."