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05/03/2010: "Joint Council Statement NATIONAL SOCIALIST COUNCIL OF NAGALIM"


NATIONAL SOCIALIST COUNCIL OF NAGALIM


Joint Council Statement
Oking: 3rd May 2010

The National Socialist council of Nagalim (NSCN) in its joint meeting of the Cabinet and steering Committee has taken serious note of the decision taken by the Manipur State Government Cabinet to prevent the visit of our General Secretary, Th. Muivah, to his birth place in Ukhrul. We consider this move as an affront to the inherent rights of the Nagas. The decision of the State Cabinet is deemed to be calculated and defy the initiative of the Government of India (GOI) and the NSCN to resolve the more than six decades of Indo-Naga conflict through peaceful political negotiation.

The NSCN considers the State Cabinet decision opposing the visit of our General Secretary as anti-peace and suppression of the people’s rights. The deliberate ploy of the Manipur State Government to prevent the interaction with the Naga people is a move to disrupt the hard earned peace. The divisive steps are pure and simple; a sign of naked chauvinism that does not respect the human rights of all including the Naga peoples’.

The NSCN seriously question the double standard of the GOI in back-tracking its commitment to the itinerary of our General Secretary. We see the volt face of the GOI and its underhand backing of the state security forces as criminal and treacherous. Giving free rein to the forces trying to disrupt the Indo - Naga peace process clearly exposes the dubious role of the GOI. The fence-sitting policy of the GOI will lead to uncontainable situation and in such eventuality the NSCN will not be held responsible. We also will not remain a silent spectator if the life and existence of our people are endangered. The NSCN therefore urge the GOI to control the situation before it goes out of hand.

We will negotiate on the foundation based on our historical rights. We have come this far respecting the history and human rights of other peoples’ but the visible forces of antagonism trying to undermine our rights and the stratagem to destabilize the peace – building process cannot be ignored anymore. We believe that the time is ripe to usher peace in the region. We are committed in our search for peace, however, under such state of affairs wherein peace is threatened by forces antagonistic to peaceful and honourable political solution the NSCN will be forced to take alternative measures to defend our commitment to peace.

Thirteen years have passed after the declaration of cease-fire and in the process the GOI has officially recognized the “Unique history and situation of the Nagas”. It was also agreed that there will be cease-fire wherever there is fighting. We have come closer through such steps taken in the spirit of mutual respect and it is our earnest desire that the political peace process must be taken toward its logical conclusion by securing a final and permanent political settlement. However, our coming closer for the sake of political settlement and lasting peace should not be misconstrued as a sign of weakness.

The military way solution taken by the Manipur Government under the pretext of “Law and order” is highly questionable and the NSCN judge this approach a challenge to our very existence as peoples. The illogical approach of the Manipur government contradicting the very basis of the cease-fire agreements between the GOI and the NSCN will seriously jeopardized the ongoing peace process.

In view of extreme provocation from the Manipur state Government, the NSCN and the Naga people have been forced to accept the challenge offered by the communal forces that threatens our very existence. In the absence of mutual respect we have to go our own way and to the last we will stand to protect our people, land and historical rights. Be assured that we will leave no stone unturned to uphold these commitments. We however hope that before it is too late reason will prevail with our Meitei neighbours.

Kuknalim.

Dhaka Arrests Terror Wasbir Hussain Associate Fellow, Institute for Conflict Management, New Delhi; Director, Centre for Development and Peace Studies, Guwahati
Bangladeshi safe havens for the rebels in India’s troubled Northeast have long been critical in the persistence of a number of violent and separatist movements in the region. However, Bangladesh has once again demonstrated that it can help arrest terror if it wants to.
On Friday, April 30, 2010, officials of the Bangladesh Rifles (BDR), the country’s para-military border force, handed over 50-year-old Ranjan Daimary alias D. R. Nabla, ‘chairman’ of the separatist National Democratic Front of Bodoland (NDFB), to India’s Border Security Force (BSF) authorities, at Dawki in Meghalaya, right on the border between the two countries. The dreaded terror mastermind was then taken into custody by the Assam Police, who drove him in to Guwahati, the state capital. It is now clear that Daimary was actually held by authorities in Bangladesh several weeks ago, and it took some brisk diplomatic maneuvers by New Delhi to finally convince Dhaka to hand him over to India.
Daimary — directly named by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) for involvement in the October 30, 2008, serial bombings in Guwahati and elsewhere, which killed 88 people and injured 540 — is the second chief of a frontline insurgent group in Assam to have been captured and handed over to India by Bangladesh. On December 4, 2009, the exiled ‘chairman’ of the outlawed United Liberation Front of Asom (ULFA), and the outfit’s ‘deputy commander-in-chief’ Raju Baruah, were handed over to Indian authorities at Dawki by the BDR in a similar manner. Earlier, in November 2009, another two top ULFA leaders, ‘foreign secretary’ Sasadhar Choudhury, and ‘finance secretary’ Chitraban Hazarika, had been turned in to Indian authorities at the Gokul Nagar post of the BSF, before they were brought to Guwahati by an Assam Police team.
Dhaka’s decision to cooperate with India is another story, but Daimary landing in the custody of the Assam Police is being seen as a big blow, not just to the anti-peace talk faction of the NDFB, but to insurgency as a whole in Northeast India’s largest state. Daimary, who holds a masters degree in Political Science, founded the NDFB on October 3, 1986, originally as the Boro Security Force, but re-christened NDFB on November 25, 1994. In pursuit of his dream to achieve an independent Bodo homeland, comprising parts of western and northern Assam, Daimary let loose a reign of terror across the State, ordering his men to kill, extort and intimidate politicians, businessmen, cadres of rival Bodo groups, and the general population.
On October 8, 2004, the NDFB called a unilateral ceasefire in the wake of a sustained counter-insurgency operation. The group’s unilateral truce was initially not reciprocated by the Government. By that time, however, a faction headed by Govinda Basumatary was already drifting away from Daimary. Eventually, a ceasefire agreement was reached on May 25, 2005, after the authorities released Basumatary, who was then in prison. Daimary refused to abide by the ceasefire and continued with his belligerent posturing. The split in the NDFB between a pro-talk faction headed by Basumatary and the anti-talk faction headed by Daimary, was completed with Basumatary group holding a ‘general assembly’ at their designated truce-time camp on December 15, 2008.
The trigger for this formal split was the October 30, 2008, serial explosions in Guwahati, Barpeta Road, Kokrajhar and Bongaigaon, later officially stated to have been orchestrated by Daimary himself. The NDFB pro-talks faction, gauging the public outrage at the mayhem, formalized the split, further isolating Daimary. The CBI charge-sheet in this case, filed in the third week of May 2009 at the court of the Special Judicial Magistrate in Guwahati, named 19 people, of which five were in detention and the rest absconding. One of those absconders was Daimary. Confessions by some of those arrested indicted Daimary as the kingpin of the entire plot, which was hatched in July 2008 itself, when the would-be bombers had begun to procure the cars used in the attacks. Daimary had been booked on charges that included murder, attempted murder, causing grievous injury, criminal conspiracy, waging war against the state, extortion, possession of illegal arms, among others.
Before Daimary’s capture, many believed that a permanent peace was unlikely to come to Assam’s Bodo heartland, unless the anti-talk NDFB leader was roped into the dialogue process which had started with the pro-talks faction. With Daimary now in custody, things are not going to be easy for the Government, both in the State and at the Centre. A facile ‘forgive and forget’, as has been the case with so many other militant leaders, may not be possible in this case, with the people baying for Daimary’s blood, in view of his role in the October 30, 2008, serial blasts. 53 of the 88 deaths in those attacks took place in Guwahati, and 20 in Kokrajhar, the Bodo hub, and the anger against its perpetrators is widespread.
The Government is also aware that there is hardly any political space available in the Bodo heartland to accommodate the various insurgent leaders. The Bodo People’s Front (BPF), the political party formed by the erstwhile Bodo Liberation Tiger (BLT) rebels following the Bodo Accord of 2003, has once again convincingly won elections on April 9, 2010, to the 40-member Bodoland Territorial Council (BTC), capturing 32 seats. The BPF, led by former rebel leaders who were arch-rivals of the NDFB, is now in power in the Bodo Council. Moreover, the NDFB pro-talks faction has a clear head-start in the political process, as against the anti-talks group that continued to hold out. Any attempt to inject Daimary into the ‘peace process’ at this stage would face strong resistance from the pro-talks faction, and would hardly be welcomed by the BPF. By all available indications, neither of these groups would want to share any space whatsoever with Daimary, at least for now.
There can now be little doubt about Dhaka’s sincerity or capability in tackling terror, particularly in cracking down on insurgents working against India’s interests from that country. A transformation has clearly come about following the regime change in Bangladesh after the December 2008 elections, when the Awami League led by Sheikh Hasina assumed power. Talking to this writer in April 2010, Bangladesh’s High Commissioner in India, Tariq Ahmed Karim, declared, "The world has seen our resolve to fight terrorism and India has acknowledged it at the highest level. We shall not allow any terrorist act against India to be carried out from our territory." Contrary to Dhaka’s initial reluctance to admit having picked up insurgent leaders like ULFA chairman Arabinda Rajkhowa and others and then handing them over to India, High Commissioner Karim now openly admits Bangladesh’s cooperation in this regard.
With ULFA chairman Rajkhowa and NDFB leader Daimary having landed in Indian custody, the only insurgent chieftain of standing from Assam still on the run is Paresh Baruah, ULFA’s military chief. Paresh Baruah is now widely believed to be based in China’s Yunnan province, on the border with Myanmar. According to indications, the Government has decided to actually go ahead with the peace talks with the ULFA even without Paresh Baruah. With foreign sanctuaries for Northeast Indian insurgents shrinking, it is only a matter of time before the Government decides to seriously engage only with those factions which come forward to resolve their issues through dialogue. Insurgents in the region are certainly on the back-foot now.


---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: United Naga Council <uncnagalim@gmail.com>
Date: Mon, May 3, 2010 at 5:00 PM
Subject: Memorandum for intervention
To: pmosb@pmo.nic.in

To,
Private Secretary to Hon'ble Prime Minister of India,
Please find herewith a true copy of memorandum for immediate attention of the Hon'ble Prime Minister to address to the war like situation in Naga areas of Manipur.
Samson Remei
President, United Naga Council, Manipur
NB: Original sent by Fax.
To, Dated: Tahamzam (Senapati), May 3, 2010
The Hon’ble Prime Minister
Govt. of India, New Delhi.
\Subject: Unprovoked War-like situation created by the state Government of Manipur in Naga Areas in the guise of enforcement of ban on entry of Mr. Th. Muivah, Ato Kilonser to visit his native village.
Respected Sir,
The United Naga Council, the apex organization of the Nagas under the administration of Manipur state has been happily awaiting the visit of Mr. Th. Muivah, Hon’ble Ato Kilonser, GPRN and Peace Negotiator of the Naga people to his native village Somdal, Ukhrul, Tahamzam (Senapati) and other places during the scheduled National Peace Tour. The Naga People looks forward with great fervor to the opportunity to warmly receive the Chief Negotiator of the Nagas in the Indo-Naga peace talks and to honor him for his tremendous contribution towards international Peace in the South East Asian Region.
However, following the quixotic cabinet decision of the state government of Manipur to ban the entry of Mr. Th. Muivah, a war like situation has been created at Mao/Tadubi/Maram, Somdal, Ukhrul, Senapati, Jessami and several vulnerable places from the afternoon of the previous day, i.e. 2nd May, 2010 with the sudden deployment of thousands of its state armed forces in civilian areas, construction of bunkers, positioning of armoured cars, water cannons, etc. The insensitivity of dismantling of the traditional welcome gates erected by the Naga villages to welcome Mr. Th. Muivah on the same evening by the state armed forces at Mao Gate is an insult to the Naga tradition and culture and speaks eloquently of the Manipur State Government’s disregard for the people they claim to represent. We are convinced that the Manipur State Government is making a deliberate attempt to demonstrate its sphere of influence with the threat of force and to the extend of imposing indefinite curfew & U/S CrPC 144 at Ukhrul, Mao/Tadubi, Senapati and along NH 39 since 05:00 pm May 2, 2010 compelling all educational institutions to be closed indefinitely.

The Naga people have been looking forward to the long awaited visit of Mr Th. Muivah, which will promote peace at the grass roots, create better understanding and relationship with the different communities. But the irresponsible act of the State Government to sabotage the dawning peace in the region now stands in stark contrast to the role of a Government of the people that facilitates and promotes the resolutions of conflicts and honourable settlements.

We humbly submit the above mentioned facts with urgency for your kind information with the request to kindly intervene in the matter to enable his scheduled visit peacefully and to also reiterate the support and aspiration of the Nagas for peace as a means to bringing a negotiated settlement through to the Indo-Naga Peace Talk.


(GRACE T. SHATSANG) (SAMSON REMEI)
President, Naga Women’s Union, Manipur. President, United Naga Council.


(ADANI DAVID MAO) (PHAMHRING SENGUL)
President, All Naga Students’ Assn. Manipur. Convenor, Naga Peoples’ Movement for Human Rights
Copy to:
1. The Hon’ble Union Minister of Home, New Delhi for kind information.
2. The Hon’ble Union Minister, Defense, New Delhi for kind information
3. The Hon’ble Chairperson, U P A, New Delhi for kind information.
4. The Governor, Manipur, Imphal for kind information.
5. The Home Secretary, Govt. of India, New Delhi, for kind information.
6. The President, Naga Hoho/Naga Mother’s Assn,/ Tribal Hohos Kohima for kind information.
7. The President, Naga Students’ Federation, Kohima for kind information
8. The Secretary General, NPMHR, Kohima for kind information.




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