Insurgency / Assam

SILIGURI, Dec 29: The crackdown on the militant camps by Bhutan Government had a serious impact on the Kamatapur Liberation Organisation(KLO), which in turn, will restrict the movement of the militants belonging to the United Liberation Front of Asom (ULFA) and the National Democratic Front of Boroland (NDFB) through the North Bengal corridor.

However, the security agencies are not ruling out the possibility of retaliatory violence by the militant groups out of frustration in the North Bengal area as any major act of sabotage in the area can cut off the entire north-eastern region from the...

NEW DELHI, Dec 29: The Royal Government of Bhutan is still undecided about handing over the bodies of the militants who were killed in operations in the country. Highly placed sources said that they are still continuing with the operations, which are spread out in remote areas in districts spread all over the country. The issue of handing over the bodies of the slain militants is yet to be worked out, sources said. The Royal Bhutan Army (RBA) is also yet to come out with the death toll among the militants. Initial reports pouring in from the country suggest that at least 70 militants were...

Tezpur/Guwahati, Dec. 28: Ulfa leader Bhimkanta Buragohain struck a defiant note two days after making a plea for peace, saying he would await instructions from the outfit?s chairman Arabinda Rajkhowa and commander-in-chief Paresh Barua on his ?future course of action?. Buragohain, in his eighties, was presumed dead until the army paraded him and three more Ulfa members before the media in Tezpur on Friday. He was produced before the additional chief judicial magistrate along with his comrades this afternoon and remanded in police custody for five days.

The veteran Ulfa member?s remark on...

Dec. 28: On the run in Bhutan, Indian militants have made a dramatic appeal to China to provide ?safe passage? and ?temporary shelter?. ?At this moment, they (the cadre) have no other option but to enter the territory of the People?s Republic of China extra-legally to save their lives, negotiating sub-zero temperature and starvation.? We would like to request you and your people to permit them safe passage to your territory and temporary shelter necessary for their survival,? said a joint appeal signed by Ulfa chairman Arabinda Rajkhowa.

The appeal was faxed to the ?Chairman of the People?s...

TEZPUR, Dec 28 ? The Additional Chief Judicial Magistrate Tezpur, HC Sharma today remanded the founder of ULFA and its political advisor Bhimkanta Buragohain (alias ?Mama?), along with three other ULFA leaders ? including self-styled major Robin Handique, Bolin Das alias Kamal Kachari and SS major Dr Amarjit Gogoi ? to five days? police custody. Talking to The Assam Tribune, counsels of the ULFA leaders, advocates Bijon Mahajan, Subhash Biswas, Bhaskar Dev Konwar, Nikabur Jaman and Raju Pradhan, informed that the ULFA leaders were produced before the residence of the Additional CJM this...

GUWAHATI, Dec 28 ? ULFA chairman Arabinda Rajkhowa has appealed to the People's Republic of China to offer safe passage to the ultras for temporary shelter in that country, reports PTI. Rajkhowa, in a letter faxed to the ?Chairman of the Peoples Republic of China? on December 25, copies of which were e-mailed to a section of the local media here today, said that of late ?we have come under massive attack of Indo-Bhutan joint forces and our combatants have been forced to retreat up to Sino-Bhutan border due to all-out air and artillery campaigns?. Rajkhowa said that at this moment ?they have no...

TEZPUR, Dec 28? ULFA?s political adviser and the founder of the outfit Bhimkanta Buragohain, who is presently in police custody in Sonitpur district after he alongwith four other ULFA cadres, was handed over by the Indian Army to the State Police, said that he had not surrendered before anybody including the Royal Bhutanese Army (RBA).

In an exclusive interview to The Assam Tribune, here Buragohain, popularly known as ?mama? in the rank and file of the outfit, said the attack on the North-east-based militant outfits (ULFA, NDFB and KLO) by the RBA was beyond imagination. The RBA has betrayed...

NEW DELHI, Dec 28 ? Acting along expected lines, the Government of India has turned down ULFA?s conditional offer for negotiations, even as the suspension of flights between Bhutan and Bangladesh came into effect today. The outlawed ULFA?s offer for talks with a slight variation was not what New Delhi was expecting and it was promptly rejected. The Government of India is interested to hold dialogues with ULFA but without any pre-conditions, Chief Minister, Tarun Gogoi had told newsmen on Friday here after deliberating on the issue with officials of Union Government.

Union Minister of State...

New Delhi, Dec. 27: The militant Dima Halam Daoga (DHD), which entered into a ceasefire with the Centre in January, has expressed dissatisfaction over slow progress in its peace process with the government. The ceasefire with the outfit, which has been demanding a separate ?homeland? for the Dimasas in Assam and Nagaland, was extended twice this year.

However, the Centre is yet to begin talks with the outfit though its leadership was summoned to Delhi thrice during this month.

?We were intimated about the talks in December thrice, only to be cancelled later. The operation in Bhutan was cited...

Tezpur/Guwahati, Dec. 27: The Ulfa and the NDFB reeled under further setbacks today with 51 militants captured by the Royal Bhutan Army being handed over to the police in Nalbari and Darrang districts. There were reports that all Ulfa, KLO, and NDFB camps in Bhutan have been razed to the ground.

Of the 51 rebels, 32 were handed over at Tamulpur in Nalbari district and the remaining 19 at Mangaldoi in Darrang district. Sources said another batch of nearly 30 Ulfa and NDFB rebels is likely to handed over by the RBA tomorrow.

In Mangaldoi, the army also handed over 18 AK-56 rifles with bayonets...