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02/27/2010: "PM sets up date with Muivah OUR CORRESPONDENT The Telegraph"



PM sets up date with Muivah OUR CORRESPONDENT The Telegraph


NSCN-IM leaders Th. Muivah and Isak Chishi Swu during an earlier visit at Camp Hebron. Swu is unlikely to take part in the talks
Kohima,: Prime Minister Manmohan Singh will meet the leaders of NSCN (I-M) next week in New Delhi to carry forward the Naga peace process.
Singh is expected to meet NSCN general secretary Thuingaleng Muivah on March 2 to add tempo to the almost stalled Naga peace process. “Yes, he is meeting the Prime Minister of India,” A.Z. Jami, kilonser (minister) in-charge of ministry of information and publicity of the Government of the People’s Republic of Nagalim (GPRN) told The Telegraph.
The NSCN leader will arrive in New Delhi from Amsterdam on Saturday. He will be received by top NSCN/GPRN leaders and Nagas staying in New Delhi. Four top leaders of the Naga group have already reached the national capital to review security for their leader when he lands in New Delhi.
“We are reviewing security for his arrival,” said a senior functionary of the group from Delhi who did not want to be named.
Jami and other top officials of the group have confirmed that NSCN chairman Isak Chishi Swu would not be coming to New Delhi for the talks this time. “I have not heard about him coming,” Jami said. According to NSCN sources, there was a problem with his travel documents. The sources said he is in South Asia. Earlier, he was in the Philippines.
Tongmeth Wangnao and Jognny Dilbung, members of steering committee, the highest policy making body of the group, education kilonser Vikiye Sumi and Imcha Longkumer, secretary, ministry of information and publicity, have reached Delhi. They will meet security and home ministry officials for Muivah’s safety.
A senior NSCN functionary said Singh had invited the NSCN leaders for talks. “The Prime Minister had invited our leaders and therefore ato kilonser (prime minister) has decided to come to Delhi,” the NSCN official said.
He said the crucial Naga talks would begin with the meeting of Muivah and Singh which will be followed by intensive discussions between the NSCN and the other leaders, led by the Centre’s newly appointed interlocutor, retired petroleum secretary R.S. Pandey, a former chief secretary of Nagaland.
V.S. Atem, convenor of the steering committee, along with senior members of the group, will join Muivah during the talks. Jami said he would not be joining the talks this time.
NSCN sources said the Centre had drafted a 29-point counter proposal to hammer out a solution to the Naga problem. The proposals include financial sops and greater autonomy.
The NSCN said the Centre had agreed to joint defence and foreign affairs and a common currency, but the contentious issue which still remained was integration of contiguous Naga areas under a single administrative unit.
The NSCN leaders were categorical that integration of Naga areas would be the basis for the solution to the Naga problem.
Amendment of the Constitution will be part of the “political package” which will be offered to the NSCN, said Union home secretary G.K. Pillai. “We are not offering a conditional package to the NSCN. It is up to them to take it,” Pillai had said during his visit to the state in October.
He, however, said the “political package” would be honourable and acceptable to both the Centre and the NSCN. On Naga integration, Pillai said the decision would be taken by the political leadership in New Delhi.
New Push to Peace Talks IMPHAL FREE PRESS

The news that the Prime Minister of India, Dr. Manmohan Singh and NSCN(IM) leader Th. Muivah are scheduled to meet early next month in New Delhi, should be a matter of intense interest for many. According to report, Muivah is expected to arrive in India from the Netherlands on February 27, Saturday. Speculations would already be rife on what might transpire in the meeting between the two leaders, more pertinently what each might be willing to concede at the end of the meeting. Would this meeting be the initiation of a new direction to the Naga peace process? Would it show a way out of the 10 years limbo the peace process has been condemned to? If there are any concessions made, what would be the costs to be paid and consequences to be faced? It should take no great effort for anybody to guess that it is a tight rope walk the two would be doing. But difficult as it may be, we do hope that the balance is kept so that there are no great losses for any of the stakeholders. Needless to serve the reminder that the stakeholders in this sordid story are not just those who are engaged in the peace parleys, but also those whose futures are inextricably linked with the issue. The Naga story is not a tale in an isolated political vacuum to be resolved independent of all other parallel and indeed interwoven stories. Such an approach can lead to disasters, a glimpse of which was witnessed in the Imphal valley in June of 2001.

Implicit in the diagnosis of the problem is also perhaps the answer to the problem. The biggest breakthrough that two leaders can make when they meet hence would be the acknowledgement that the Naga story is not a tale independent of all other, therefore a substantive solution would have to involve taking the other stories on board the peace boat. Given past stands and insistence on the supposed uniqueness of Naga history by the NSCN(IM) such a concession however is unlikely from Muivah, although it is predictable that Dr. Singh, who is a Rajya Sabha MP from the Assam, another state which like Manipur is a big stakeholder in the issue, would be only too happy if such an agreement were to be reached even in only in spirit. It is also a fact that unlike Manipur where despite intense tensions there have been little or no physical confrontations between the different communities on the issue, the same cannot be said of Assam. In territories of dispute especially in the North Cachar Hills, ethnic riots on related issues have today become endemic, ruining and displacing many families. Under the circumstance, it is hardly likely that Dr. Singh would risk being too liberal on conceding to the demands for giving a political boundary to the claimed Naga homeland, or Nagalim as the NSCN(IM) calls it.

Peace in the northeast, it is evident from a consideration of even the few factors we named, will not come on a platter. On the other hand, it will necessarily demand plenty of hard work and homework. The situation is grim, but to stop short of being pessimistic, we do hope there are more permutations and combinations of the known factors and stakes in this peace process than what observers from the sidelines such as those of us in the media are able to decipher. We also hope that these would present a wider and more optimistic field of vision which can bring a solution in sight: A solution which can give the restless souls of the Nagas a sanctuary without infringing into the sense of security and identity of other communities in the region. The Nagas deserve peace after more than half a century of valiant fight for their sense of identity and resultant turmoil in their society. But to think that this peace can be had at the cost of others’ sense of tranquillity and identity would be a fallacy. It is in summary, a formula which cannot work. The challenge then is for this peace process to broaden its scope. Its outlook must cease to be exclusivist. But again as they say, it needs two hands to clap. For this peace process to become inclusive, it is not just the willingness of those in the process which is called for. Those who have been out of it, and whose inclusion can take the process forward, must be equally willing to be part of the experiment. There is no easy answer to this question either, given the postures the latter groups have been taking all this while.

“GPRN/NSCN” makes stand on GoI, NSCN (IM) meeting morungexpress
Dimapur, February 25 (MExN): The “GPRN/NSCN” today issued a statement expressing its opinion to the Government of India and NSCN (IM), “who are reportedly preparing to meet” in Delhi. Expressing that it was making the statement “for clarity of vision and purpose in the Indo-Naga-Burma political struggle” the MIP in a press note said “that, GPRN/NSCN has never objected to in the past, nor will it do so for the forthcoming meet between GoI and Th. Muivah because it is merely a bilateral meeting between two parties and not a political talk between GoI and the Nagas. Let it be known very clear to both the parties that the Naga political problem shall be solved by the Nagas themselves only after reconciliation and unity is achieved in Nagaland.”
Any discussion, the MIP said, between Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Th. Muivah on the Naga political issue “would be premature and unwise.” “Th. Muivah has every right to seek solutions to social problems and other issues in Ukhrul district and other Naga inhabited areas of Manipur state but solution to the Indo-Naga-Burma political problem shall be the sole prerogative of the Naga people at a right opportune time,” it said.
The “GPRN/NSCN” said that “if New Delhi is really willing to solve the Naga political issue, it should check the ground reality in Nagaland through its many agencies and realize who truly represents the Nagas.” The group added that a “composite dialogue” among different sections of society is taking place for genuine reconciliation and it is for the Government of India to make a “choice between the Naga people and a single faction.”

India, Myanmar: Reluctant brothers in arms Brian McCartan Asia Times On Line

BANGKOK - Myanmar's up and down relationship with neighboring India is on the up again with a new commitment for coordinated counter-insurgency operations along their mutual border. While previous promises to tackle armed groups failed in the actual implementation, analysts suggest there could be new impetus for strategic cooperation.

India's Home Secretary G K Pillai led a delegation to Naypyidaw in January for three days of secretarial-level talks with Myanmar officials led by Brigadier General Phone Swe. The elimination of insurgent camps in Myanmar across the border from India's violence-plagued northeastern region, featured in discussions.

India also reportedly requested progress on demarcating the

1,643 kilometer shared border and a crackdown on the cross border smuggling of narcotics, Chinese-made weapons and other goods. Pillai's meetings followed a visit to Myanmar in October by Indian Army chief General Deepak Kapoor to discuss "enhanced military cooperation''.

Northeastern India has been wracked by insurgency since the 1950s with various groups demanding independence, autonomy, or a halt to migration into their areas. The Naga went underground in 1956 seeking the formation of a Greater Nagaland encompassing areas of both India and Myanmar.

In the early 1970s, the National Socialist Council of Nagaland began setting up camps in Myanmar's northwestern Sagaing Division. Links were also forged with the Kachin Independence Army (KIA), then fighting the Myanmar government, through which it obtained weapons and training from China.

Other northeastern Indian groups followed suit. By the 1980s, the Assamese United Liberation Front of Asom (ULFA), various Manipuri rebel groups and other smaller ethnic-based groups had also set up camps in Sagaing Division as well as Kachin and Chin States.

Although China ended its assistance to the groups nearly 30 years ago, and the KIA also stopped as a result of its ceasefire with the government in 1994, by 2005 there were still at least 27 full-time camps in western Myanmar. ULFA, which is seeking an independent state for the Assamese, has by different estimates between 3,000 and 6,000 fighters and at least four major camps in Myanmar, including the headquarters of its 28th Battalion.

The Manipuri People's Liberation Front (MPLF), an umbrella organization of several Manipuri groups with a combined strength of up to 7,000 also has camps in Myanmar. Other smaller forces representing ethnic groups such as the Kukis and the Zomis, are also believed to maintain operations in Myanmar.

Despite this large number of armed insurgents on its western border, Myanmar's military has paid much less attention to this area compared to its eastern and northern borders with Thailand and China. Analysts and diplomats believe that this is because the groups represent little immediate threat to Myanmar's territorial integrity and unity.

ULFA, the Manipuris and other groups confine their attacks to targets across the border in India and use Myanmar for rest and training. Some opposition groups have alleged that local Myanmar military officers receive monthly payments from the Indian groups to ignore their cadre and camps.

Myanmar's own insurgent groups in the area are small and not viewed by the generals as posing as big a security threat as the much larger ceasefire and non-ceasefire armies in eastern and northern Myanmar. Groups such as the Arakan Liberation Army (ALA) and the Chin National Front (CNF), which operate in northern Arakan State and Chin State, each number only 100 or 200 men. Operations against these groups usually take the form of periodic sweeps and the occasional ambush.

The exception is the National Socialist Council of Nagaland (NSCN) faction led by S S Khaplang in Sagaing. The group, which is linked to Naga nationalists on the Indian side of the border, may have as many as several thousand fighters, according to some estimates. The Myanmar Army has pursued the NSCN more determinedly, attacking it was recently as November 2009.

This, however, reflects the general's view that the NSCN's aim of an independent Nagaland is a direct threat to Naypyidaw's unity and national integrity rather than any determination to assist India, analysts say. India, on the other hand, has made the elimination of the insurgent camps a key component of its foreign policy with Myanmar.

Controversial exchanges
India was previously a strong supporter of the pro-democracy movement in Myanmar following the military crackdown of peaceful protestors in 1988. That changed, however, when New Delhi launched its new "Look East" foreign policy in 1991 aimed at counteracting growing Chinese influence in Southeast Asia. Military and diplomatic exchanges were stepped up and new economic and development initiatives put forward.

Considerable effort has been placed on convincing Myanmar's junta to participate in counter-insurgency campaigns along the border. India has offered the regime artillery, radar and radio systems, and Myanmar military officers have attended Indian military academies.

In 2006, apparently as part of a deal to conduct military operations, India said it was planning to transfer an unspecified number of T-55 tanks, armored personnel carriers, 105mm artillery pieces, mortars and helicopters. In October of that year, Indian Army Vice-Chief Lieutenant General S Pattabhiraman told Force magazine, an Indian defense and security monthly, that the transfer of artillery pieces had already begun.

In November 2006, J J Singh, the Indian army's chief of staff pledged to provide training in special warfare tactics to Myanmar soldiers. This was followed by an offer of a multi-million dollar military aid package by Indian Air Force head S P Tyagi during a visit to Naypyidaw that same month. Included in the deal were helicopters, avionics upgrades for Myanmar's Chinese and Russian-made fighters and naval surveillance aircraft. The extensive package may have been granted after Myanmar began limited operations against insurgents in the northwest.

The arms transfers were heavily criticized by foreign governments and human-rights organizations. The British government protested in particular the transfer of two BN-2 Islander maritime surveillance aircraft in August 2006. Heavy international pressure was also placed on India for a plan to transfer light helicopters produced by Hindustan Aeronautical Limited (HAL) that included European parts covered under a European Union arms embargo against Myanmar. By December 2007, India had quietly halted the arms transfers.

Myanmar's generals have since shown little determination to carry out military campaigns along the western border. In 1995, a joint operation known as Operation Golden Bird, aimed at flushing out ULFA, NSCN and Manipuri fighters in camps along the border, ended abruptly when Myanmar withdrew its troops after New Delhi presented the Jawaharlal Nehru Award for International Understanding to pro-democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi.

Since then there have been few military operations against insurgent groups based in Myanmar's western regions. Although Myanmar agreed in 2000 to conduct joint operations in exchange for military equipment, few military actions actually took place. An exception was a 2001 raid on four Manipuri camps that resulted in the capture of 192 insurgents and the seizure of 1,600 weapons. Seven insurgent leaders were arrested including UNLF chairman Rajkumar Meghen and Khaidem Hamedou, its general secretary.

All were inexplicably released the following year, much to the chagrin of the Indian government, which expected them to be handed over. Assurances from Myanmar's Senior General Than Shwe in 2004 that Myanmar would not allow Indian insurgent groups to use its territory were similarly followed with inaction. Again agreeing to joint operations with their Indian counterparts in 2007, Myanmar's army did very little on the ground.

Shrinking safe havens
The loss of northwestern Myanmar as a safe area would represent a major setback to Indian insurgents. Not only would they lose areas for training and regroupment, they would also yield an up-to-now reliable conduit for weapons. In January, Arunachal Pradesh home minister Tako Dabi voiced concerns over the smuggling of Chinese-made weapons through Myanmar into India. He accused India's Naga rebels of colluding with the KIA in moving the illicit weapons.

Chinese weapons were sent to the northeastern groups through the KIA in the 1970s, but this route was known to have dried up by the early 1980s as Beijing shifted policy away from backing insurgent movements and withdrew support for the Burmese Communist Party. Black market operators in China's southwestern Yunnan province filled the gap and began making weapons available to Indian groups in the 1990s.

Although the arms were produced by Chinese state-owned weapons factories, they are believed to have been trafficked by unscrupulous factory managers. While the KIA claims to have severed ties to Indian insurgents, they are still believed to have some relations and could be a possible conduit for weapons. A clearer source is the United Wa State Army (UWSA). The group has acted as a broker for Chinese-produced arms as well as selling weapons from their own arms factory near Panghsang on the China border. A Jane's Intelligence Review report in 2008 detailed the UWSA's involvement in trafficking weapons to Myanmar and Indian insurgent groups.

The loss of sanctuary in northwestern Myanmar would be profound considering that the groups have already lost safe havens in Bhutan and Bangladesh. A successful joint military operation in 2003 pushed the groups out of border areas in Bhutan. Last year, a firmer line against Indian insurgent groups sheltering in Bangladesh was taken by the government of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina.

Insurgent bank accounts were frozen and the ULFA lost its political leader Arabinda Rajkhowa and deputy commander Raju Baruah when they were arrested by Bangladeshi authorities in Cox's Bazaar in November. The crackdown is believed to have forced the ULFA to shift its camps and cadre to Myanmar. Seizures in Bangladesh of Chinese-made weapons brought in by boat and believed destined for northeastern insurgents suggested that the country's ports had become major gateways for weapons.

Insurgent's weapons supplied from China may also be in jeopardy if the UWSA and the KIA are forced to join the junta's Border Guard Force scheme, which would place them under the direct control of Naypyidaw's War Office. India's lack of influence with China means strategic engagement with Naypyidaw is its only pressure point in putting a stop to the arms trafficking.

Encouraged by these successes, New Delhi is now pushing again for joint operations with Myanmar. Myanmar vowed after the January talks that it plans to carry out coordinated operations with the Indian army against insurgent camps along their mutual border.

As part of these operations, the Myanmar army says it will make efforts to track down and arrest insurgent leaders, especially ULFA commander Paresh Barua. Following the January talks, an Indian home ministry official announced: "Security forces of India and Myanmar will conduct coordinated operations in their respective territories in the next two to three months. The objective of the operation is that no militant can escape to the other side after facing the heat on one side."

No date has been set for the commencement of the operations and coordination between the two forces, including intelligence sharing, has not yet been worked out.

India is already beefing up its forces in the area, recently deploying a field intelligence unit of its Assam Rifles battalion. The government also said it will raise another 26 battalions of Assam Rifles, at the rate of two to three per year, to secure border areas in Nagaland and Manipur states and support counterinsurgency operations.

For its part, Naypyidaw has said it still needs to build up its forces in its remote northwestern regions. They will likely be hard-pressed to launch an offensive in the area while engaged in a war of nerves with former ceasefire groups in the north over a scheme to transform them into military-led border guard forces.

Other forces are needed to contain still-active insurgencies in the eastern part of the country. More forces will presumably be needed to ensure control of central portions of the country in the lead up to general elections planned for the later half of this year.

It would likely be an unpopular move to carry out military operations while voters are going to the polls. However the generals have used the existence of the Indian groups as leverage with New Delhi in the past, and could conceivably use them as bargaining chips to gain legitimacy for the elections from the world's largest democracy.

The junta needs all the international support it can muster for elections which most observers and analysts believe is a forgone conclusion in favor of military-backed candidates. By offering support for an outcome that will likely further consolidate the military's hold on power, New Delhi could yet move the generals towards action in tackling insurgents along the border.

Brian McCartan is a Bangkok-based freelance journalist. He may be reached at brianpm@comcast.net.

(Copyright 2010 Asia Times Online (Holdings) Ltd. All rights reserved. Please contact us about sales, syndication and republishing.)


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