The coordinated assaults targeted two of Mumbai's best-known hotels, the Taj Mahal and the Trident, with gunmen taking hostages and engaging in gunfights with anti-terrorist squads.

Here are some eye-witnesses accounts of the Wednesday night attacks in Mumbai:

One British guest at the Taj told local Indian television that he had been among a dozen people herded together by two heavily armed men and taken up to the hotel's upper floors.

'They were very young, like boys really, wearing jeans and T-shirts,' the guest said.

'They said they wanted anyone with British and American passports and then they took us up the stairs. I think they wanted to take us to the roof,' he said, adding that he and another hostage managed to escape on the 18th floor. -----

The head of the Madrid government and a British member of the European Parliament were inside when the gunmen stormed the building but escaped unhurt.

'All I saw was one man on foot carrying a machine gun-type of weapon - which I then saw him firing from and I saw people hitting the floor, people right next to me,' MEP Sajjad Karim was quoted as saying by the BBC website.

A fellow MEP from Spain, Mr Ignasi Guardans, spoke to Spain's Radio Nacional network as he took shelter in a restaurant.

'The terrorists are driving around Mumbai shooting in the air and hurling grenades from cars,' Mr Guardans said. ------

'I guess they were after foreigners, because they were asking for British or American passports,' said Mr Rakesh Patel, a British witness who lives in Hong Kong and was staying at the Taj Mahal hotel on business. 'They had bombs.'

'They came from the restaurant and took us up the stairs,' he told the NDTV news channel, smoke stains all over his face.

'Young boys, maybe 20 years old, 25 years old. They had two guns.' India has suffered a wave of bomb attacks in recent years.

The BBC News website said a British member of the European Parliament, Mr Sajjad Karim, was also in the hotel at the time and saw a gunman open fire in the lobby.

'All I saw was one man on foot carrying a machine gun-type of weapon - which I then saw him firing from and I saw people hitting the floor, people right next to me,' he was quoted as saying. --------------

A British citizen who was dining at the Oberoi hotel told Sky News television that the gunmen who struck there singled out Britons and Americans.

Mr Alex Chamberlain said a gunman, a young man of 22 or 23, ushered 30 or 40 people from the restaurant into a stairway and ordered everyone to put up their hands. He said the gunman spoke in Hindi or Urdu.

'They were talking about British and Americans specifically. There was an Italian guy, who, you know, they said: 'Where are you from?' and he said he's from Italy and they said 'fine' and they left him alone. And I thought: 'Fine, they're going to shoot me if they ask me anything - and thank God they didn't,' he said.

Mr Chamberlain said he managed to slip away as the patrons were forced to walk up stairs, but he thought much of the group was being held hostage.