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Assam : Bhutan vows to keep ULFA away

	November 27, 2006

Bhutan has assured Assam that it would not allow its territory to be used by “militants inimical to the state and India”. The assurance was given by a Bhutanese delegation that visited the state last week for a co-ordination meeting with the Assam Government. Asserting that Assam’s militant outfit ULFA has been completely wiped out from the Himalayan Kingdom, the delegation asked for “evidence” to substantiate claim that ULFA had found its way back into Bhutan.



The team met Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi on Nov. 23 and promised to co-operate with security forces on their side of the border.



Gogoi told the media later that there may not be any ULFA camps inside Bhutan, but militants were definitely sneaking in and out of the neighbouring country. “The militants are said to be taking temporary shelter in that country, but the Bhutanese delegation has promised us that they will not allow any camp to be set up. Bhutan will also co-operate with us in checking militancy,” the Chief Minister said.







Bhutanese officials also met Chief Secretary S. Kabilan. Their two-day co-ordination meeting with representatives of the state was extended by a day to enable both sides to discuss issues in greater detail.



Summing up the three-day deliberation between the two sides on wide-ranging bilateral issues, Daso Tsering Wangda, joint secretary, home, in the Royal Bhutan government, said Assam should take advantage of the huge trade and tourist potential of his country.



The meeting focused on power, water management and tourism as the core areas for co-operation.



Wangda said insurgency had affected development in the eastern part of his country, but Bhutan was now determined to develop these areas. “It goes without saying that we will not allow any insurgent group to set up camps inside Bhutan.”



To ensure that militants do not sneak into their territory, Bhutan’s security forces are regularly patrolling the border. Wangda said the Indian security forces should also ensure that militants do not sneak into Bhutan.



He made it clear that the militant leaders who were arrested during Operation All Clear in December 2003 were handed over to the Indian government. India has been insisting that it had no knowledge about the whereabouts of the ULFA leaders who went missing during the operation.



Insisting on enhancing bilateral trade between Assam and Bhutan, Wangda pointed out that India contributes 90 per cent of Bhutan’s total volume of annual import, which is in the range of four to five thousand crores in Indian currency.



“At present, the bulk of export is from West Bengal. There is also a large flow of tourists from that state,” Wangda said. Assam had not even started exploring these potentials, he added.



The meeting observed that there was tremendous scope for mutual co-operation in the power sector. Assam home commissioner Rajib Bora said the state could immensely benefit from the ongoing power and cement projects that were coming up in Bhutan as the neighbouring country has decided to transport the raw materials for the projects through Assam.



Impressed by the development of Bhutan, state Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi expressed his desire to visit the Himalayan Kingdom.





ULFA intensifies its terrorist acts



Meanwhile, the banned militant outfit, ULFA has intensified its subversive activities in Assam. At least four persons were killed and many injured in a bomb blast that rocked the parking lot of Guwahati railway station. The incident came just over a fortnight after co-ordinated blasts at two places in the state capital claimed 16 lives.



The bomb, with a timer connected to it, had been planted on a cycle rickshaw. Inspector-general of police (law and order) D.K. Pathak named the proscribed ULFA as the main suspect. The militant group usually strikes at soft targets on or before its annual “protest day”, November 27.



Kusheswar Sarma, officer-in-charge of the Government Railway Police post at the railway station, said the casualties would have been higher had the explosion occurred five minutes earlier.

“Just five minutes before the bomb went off in front of my eyes, I had dispersed 70 to 80 people from the parking lot. We do not allow crowding in and around the railway station these days,” he said.





West Bengal train blasts : ULFA or Bangla link suspected



Forensic experts investigating the West Bengal train blasts that killed eight people, suspect that ULFA might have helped the Kamtapur Liberation Organisation (KLO) in executing the terror strike, the first major act of subversion in the Communist-ruled state.



Central security agencies, however, pointed a finger at Jamaat-ul-Mujahideen, which, they believe, used the KLO to trigger the blast in the Haldibari-New Jalpaiguri passenger train.



Senior railway police officials said the explosive, with a timer device, was brought by the United Liberation Front of Asom from Bangladesh and handed over to KLO activists.



Although there were differences between intelligence brass in New Delhi and Calcutta on who provided the support to the KLO, both agreed that the source of the explosive was Bangladesh.



ULFA and the KLO have been known to work together in the past. Police said without help from ULFA, which has greater access to sophisticated arms and ammunition, it would not have been possible for the KLO to get the explosive.





ULFA regrouping



The new Chief of the Army’s 4 Corps, Lt Gen. R.K. Chhabra, said that ULFA regrouped and became stronger after the brief truce declared by Delhi before Independence Day. “They have come out very strong and without inhibitions about killing defenceless civilians,” he said



Interacting with the media for the first time since taking over as the general-officer-commanding of the Tezpur-headquartered 4 Corps, Lt Gen. R.K. Chhabra said on Nov. 22 that the increase in ULFA’s strength could be gauged from the spate of attacks since the truce was revoked on September 23.



Statistics bore him out. Since the ceasefire was abrogated, ULFA militants have triggered as many as 23 blasts across Assam, killing 20 people and leaving 106 wounded.



Expressing doubts over ULFA’s professed seriousness about negotiating a settlement with Delhi, Lt Gen. Chhabra said the outfit’s activities suggested otherwise. He said ULFA used the period of truce for extortion, recruitment and relocation of arms and camps.



The GOC said the ISI and the directorate-general of field intelligence of Bangladesh were extending moral and material support to ULFA, including finance, arms and explosives. He also expressed concern over the proliferation of jihadi elements in the state.



Lt Gen. Chhabra said information available with the Army indicated the presence of jihadi elements in the char areas - mostly migrant settlements - along the Brahmaputra. “Jihadis are very much here and the threat is real.”



On whether ULFA was setting up new camps outside Assam, the general said the militant group has shelters in Arunachal Pradesh and Meghalaya where its wounded fighters recuperate. As for ULFA militants re-entering Bhutan, he said they might be using that country as a “temporary base”.





Al Qaida message on cell phones



The Army is investigating the source of a multimedia message clip now doing the rounds in South Assam.



Several mobile phone subscribers, most of them Muslims, have complained about receiving a video clipping showing al Qaida militants beheading a man.



The MMS, which has been circulating for the past 10 days, also carries exhortations in Arabic to foster the jihadi spirit and fight for Islam.



Army sources suspect that the message may have originated from pro-Al Qaida militants now active in Sylhet in neighbouring Bangladesh, which shares its border with the Barak Valley districts.



The message shows both India and the US in a derogatory light. It surfaced soon after a Sylhet court sentenced two militants of the pro-Al Qaida Harkat-ul-Jihad-al-Islami (Huji) to life imprisonment.



Sources in the Army said a large group of Al Qaida activists had sailed to Chittagong in a ship called MV Mecca in December 2001 soon after the fall of the Taliban regime in Afghanistan.



They struck root in Bangladesh by joining fundamentalist groups there, including the al Haramain.





Change in strategy and focus



Security forces are focusing on “specific” areas rather than spreading themselves thin as part of the new strategy to rein in ULFA militants.



Director-general of police D.N. Dutt confirmed in Guwahati on Nov. 23 that deployment and redeployment of forces was taking place with the focus on Dhemaji, Lakhimpur, Sivasagar, Baksa and Nalbari. He said “necessary” precautions were also being taken to counter the possibility of ULFA militants hitting soft targets on its annual “protest day” on Nov. 27.



Dutta said “special attention” was being paid to Baksa and Nalbari, bordering Bhutan. Intelligence reports have warned of attacks by ULFA militants on senior civil and police officials in these border districts.





ULFA drive to recruit Bangladeshis



Unable to recruit young people from Assam for its operations, the ULFA is now recruiting poor Bangladeshi youth into its ranks for acts of terrorism in the country. According to intelligence sources ULFA is finding it difficult to recruit Assamese youth in its ranks and is now learnt to be recruiting young people from poor families of Bangladesh.



Stating that the chief of ULFA’s Army wing Paresh Barua is known to have visited Pakistan to seek its assistance in the outfit’s activities, the sources said Pakistani youth were also likely to “very soon” join in the outfit’s activities.



“In times to come, militancy in Assam will be hijacked by these elements and ULFA will only be a facade and a nominal force tagging along,” the sources said, but declined to disclose how soon they expected this to happen.





ULFA flayed for National Games boycott call



The outlawed United Liberation Front of Asom has attracted criticism from all quarters for its call to boycott the upcoming 33rd National Games scheduled to begin Guwahati on next year on Feb 9.



“We shall see to it that the Games are held according to schedule. The ULFA has no right to call for a boycott and such demands are absolutely unacceptable,” said Assam Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi.



“The ULFA should not try to mix political issues with sports. Even countries having political differences participate in sporting events like the Olympic Games,” Samujjal Bhattacharyya, adviser of the All Assam Students’ Union (AASU), said.



The ULFA had called for the boycott last week. “We appeal to all the players not to participate at the National Games so long as the Assam-India conflict is not resolved,” ULFA chairman Arabinda Rajkhowa said in a statement.



The countdown for the 10-day National Games, India’s biggest sporting event, has already begun with the infrastructure and other facilities almost complete.



More than 10,000 players and officials from across the country were expected for the National Games with the countdown already beginning in Assam.