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Terror
Havens in the Land of the Thunder Dragon
Wasbir
Hussain
Separatist
insurgencies in India’s Northeast have long had an external
dimension. In 1956, Angami Zapu Phizo, who started the first tribal
insurgency in the country, went into exile in Britain, via then East
Pakistan, from where he led the Naga bush-war against New Delhi
until his death in April 1990. Phizo’s successors in the Naga
movement, as also a multiplicity of other separatist militancy’s,
have also long operated out of bases outside India.
This has
been a problem that has strained India’s ties with Bhutan since a
band of heavily armed militants belonging to the United Liberation
Front of Asom moved into the adjoining Himalayan kingdom in the
early nineties, and established well-entrenched bases there, some
what souring an otherwise agreeable bilateral relationship between
New Delhi and Thimpu. ULFA’s surviving capacity to carry out
violent operations in the north eastern Indian State of Assam —
where the group seeks to establish a ‘sovereign homeland’ — is
essentially based on their ability to cross over into safe havens in
the jungles of Southern Bhutan.
Indian
intelligence agencies put the number of ULFA camps inside Bhutan at
36 until recently, including its ‘General Headquarters’,
‘Council Headquarters’ and a number of training establishments.
An estimated 2,000 cadres, both men and women, live in these camps,
mostly located in the Southern Bhutan district of Samdrup Jhongkar,
that has a contiguous border with Assam’s western district of
Nalbari some 100 KM west of the State capital, Guwahati. It is to
these bases that the ULFA hit squads mostly return after attacks in
Indian Territory, traversing the densely wooded and porous
international border. The situation is complicated further by the
presence in Bhutan of the National Democratic Front of Bodoland (NDFB)
and Kamatapur Liberation Organization (KLO), two other terrorist
groups active in Assam. Supported by the ULFA, these groups have
established many camps on Bhutanese soil; with an estimated 21 such
camps run by the NDFB alone, though many of these are common to the
ULFA.
The
presence of the Indian separatists now tops Bhutan’s national
agenda, with the royal government describing it as a great threat to
‘national security and sovereignty.’ Counter-insurgency
officials and policy makers in India, including Assam’s Chief
Minister Tarun Gogoi, are of the view that unless the rebels are
denied sanctuary in the kingdom, militancy in Assam will remain
impossible to contain. In a conversation with the author, Chief
Minister Gogoi stated that he had already urged the Deputy Prime
Minister and Federal Home Minister, L.K.Advani, to take up the issue
of the rebels’ presence in Bhutan with the Royal Government.
In
accordance with an existing agreement, Indian paramilitary and
police personnel, though not the Army, can enter Bhutanese territory
in an extraordinary hot pursuit situation. In reality, considering
the terrain, the rebels can only be taken on in a pincer attack
backed by Bhutanese soldiers. New Delhi consequently had some
reasons for satisfaction when Bhutan’s National Assembly once
again deliberated on the presence of the Indian militants in the
kingdom during its session earlier this month and reiterated its
call to the rebels to pull out from the kingdom in a peaceful manner
or face physical eviction through military force.
Such
pullout calls to the rebels have been given by Bhutan several times
in the past. In June 2001, the ULFA and the Bhutanese Government
arrived at an agreement, which required the militants to reduce the
number of their camps and the strength of their cadres in the
kingdom, as a prelude to final withdrawal from the country. In
December 2001,Bhutanese authorities claimed that the ULFA had
‘closed down four of nine camps’ in the country. That position
has now changed, with King Jigme Singhye Wangchuk informing the
National Assembly that it was of‘no use’ if the ULFA agreed to
move two or three camps, because it would not be possible for the
authorities to determine whether remaining camps had simply been
merged or relocated elsewhere within Bhutan. The country’s Home
Minister, Thinley Gyamtsho, has stated that the ULFA hadopened a new
camp on a mountain ridge above the Samdrup Jongkhar-Tashigang
Highway, a fact corroborated by Indian intelligence officials.
As a
result, this time round, Bhutan’s National Assembly has decided to
ask the ULFA to shut down its Headquarters and presence on Bhutanese
soil, not just a few specific camps. The National Assembly thus
concluded: "If the leaders of the ULFA refuse to relocate their
headquarters, then it will be clear to the Government and people of
Bhutan that the outfit has no intention of leaving Bhutanese
territory and there would be no other option but to evict them
physically." This is a tough stance for Thimphu to maintain,
and for the ULFA, it is a difficult demand to comply with.
Evicting
the heavily armed ULFA cadres from Bhutan is easier said than done,
and here lies Assam’s problem. It is not clear whether the Royal
Bhutan Police and the Royal Bhutan Army, despite the presence of
some commando units trained by the Indian security establishment,
can take on the trained ULFA rebels. Will Bhutan finally agree to
let the Indian Army into the kingdom for a joint offensive? How does
one flush out the rebels if Indian forces are to keep waiting on the
borders to trap the fleeing militants? The greatest fear is that of
possible retaliation by the ULFA on innocent Bhutanese citizens in
case of firm action by the Royal Government.
There are
other problem areas. New Delhi will certainly be concerned over
suggestions by a few Bhutanese National Assembly members that
Thimphu should look towards China for help in tackling the
insurgents, rather than rely totally on India. These members
suggested that India might be keeping its forces on the border with
Bhutan in order to deliberately confine the rebels within the
kingdom, though Bhutanese Home Minister Gyamtsho discounted this
perspective.
Bhutanese
authorities now say they will have one last sitting with the ULFA
leadership in a bid to persuade them to leave the kingdom, lock,
stock and barrel. Clearly, the Royal Government is still keen to
resolve the matter without having to shed blood.
But,
where will the ULFA shift its men and materials if it were to honor
king Wangchuk’s wishes? Indications suggest exploratory moves
towards the Indo-Myanmar border in the north eastern Indian state of
Arunachal Pradesh, to link up with the group’s ally, the Khaplang
faction of the National Socialist Council of Nagalim (NSCN-N), who
have bases in the area. Bangladesh is another option, with much of
the organization’s senior leadership already based there.
In a telephonic interview with
the author, Bhutan’s Foreign Secretary Ugyen Tshering stated that
the ULFA leadership had told the Bhutanese authorities that they
could not fulfill their commitment to withdraw from the kingdom
because of the increased presence of Indian troops on the
Indo-Bhutan border in the Assam sector. Thimphu has since taken up
this issue with New Delhi, Tshering said.
At one stage, key officials of
the Indian Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) had mentioned the
possibility of granting the rebels safe passage to move through
Assam, if the ULFA wanted to move from Bhutan into another country.
That, again, is a decision that will have to be taken at the highest
level, and is unlikely in the present situation. Gyamtsho suggested
that New Delhi might grant the rebels ‘amnesty’ if they were to
withdraw from the kingdom and return to India. As things stand now,
however, the stage has not reached for the ULFA to take up an
amnesty offer even if New Delhi were to make one. Under the
circumstances, both India and Bhutan will continue to be haunted by
the presence of the Assamese separatists in the Land of the Thunder
Dragon.
The
author is the Consulting Editor, The Sentinel, Guwahati;
Associate Fellow, Institute for Conflict Management
By
special arrangement with Institute for Conflict Management, New
Delhi. (South Asia Intelligence Review)
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