Naga talks in serious jeopardy as NSCN-IM says ceasefire pact 'has lost meaning'

In this article, senior journalist Sanjib Kr Baruah outlines Naga Naga peace negotiations and mentions that the 23-year-old ongoing negotiations between the government and the National Socialist Council of Nagalim (Isak-Muivah) (NSCN-IM) has run into serious uncertainty with the underground organization saying the ceasefire pact has been stamped to the ground and has lost its meaning due to lack of mutual respect.

New Delhi: The 23-year-old ongoing Naga peace negotiations between the government and the National Socialist Council of Nagalim (Isak-Muivah) (NSCN-IM) has run into serious jeopardy with the underground organization saying the ceasefire pact with the government has lost meaning.

An NSCN-IM statement said, "NSCN-IM is being driven to the wall after repeated provocation and aggression. The goodwill spirit of the ceasefire has been stamped to the ground. The ceasefire has lost its meaning because ceasefire can only make sense where there is mutual respect."

The statement issued on Sunday—a day after the outfit suffered its biggest military loss in recent years when six of its cadres were gunned down by a combined team of Indian Army, Assam Rifles and Arunachal Pradesh police personnel near Nyinu village in Longding district of Arunachal Pradesh.

"Not satisfied with the killing, the ISF (Indian security forces) personnel crossed all decency as they displayed sadistic pleasure in exposing the mutilated bodies and shoving them like dead animals. In the battlefields, even enemy shows respect to fallen soldiers," it said.

Government officials said that the NSCN (IM) team had set camp in the jungles between Nyinu and Ngissa village with a plan to kidnap a Longding businessman.

Read:Everything explained about the 'History of Naga Insurgency'

Significantly, the NSCN-IM referred to the ongoing India-China border row where the two militaries are mobilizing on a big scale along the Line of Actual Control (LAC) saying that Longding district "is not far from the Indo-China border where India is having border dispute".

"What is Government of India trying to gain by targeting NSCN under any slightest pretext when its hands are full confronting the Pakistanis in the Indo-Pakistan border and the Chinese in Ladakh, Sikkim, Bhutan and Arunachal Pradesh??," the NSCN-IM asked adding that the Indo-Naga political talks “has achieved much but honoured very little."

The seven-decades-old Naga underground moment has got old 'connections' with China since 1967 when the first batch of 133 Naga insurgents travelled to China for training in weapons and doctrination. Several batches had followed later.

The long course of the process of the negotiations has largely resulted in the NSCN-IM giving up on many of its demands.

After watering down its demand for total sovereignty and independence to ‘shared sovereignty’, the government had not committed to the NSCN-IM on its demand for a ‘Greater Nagalim’ or a homeland for Nagas that includes chunks of territory from Manipur, Arunachal Pradesh and Assam, and then also refused to concede to the demand for a separate constitution and a Naga national flag.

Read:By gunning down 6 Naga insurgents, Govt tests limits of NSCN-IM ability, willingness

Saturday’s Longding gunfight follows an ominous chain of events.

On June 6, Nagaland Governor RN Ravi in a letter to CM Neiphiu Rio termed the insurgent groups as ‘armed gangs’ running large-scale extortion and illegal activity.

It was followed by a July 7 order by the Nagaland government to all its employees to furnish a declaration within a month, providing information and details of any family member or relatives who are involved with ‘underground’ organisations.

With the latest stand being taken by the NSCN-IM, it remains to be seen whether the situation worsens to a point where the underground organization formally calls off the ceasefire pact in which case open hostilities would be the next fallout.