Indian rebels on the move in
Myanmar By Subir Bhaumik
NEW DELHI and TAMU - Despite India's
repeated requests to act, Myanmar's government is
still perceived by Indian officials as "going
easy" on Indian separatists known to be operating
out of Myanmar's northwestern fringes.
More than two months after promising tough
action against separatist rebels based in its
territory during Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's
visit to Myanmar, President Thein Sein's
quasi-civilian government is yet to commence any
sort of crackdown against the rebels, many of whom
are known to be based in Myanmar's Sagaing
Division and border towns like Tamu.
Indian officials raised the issue again
during a visit to New Delhi in early August by
Myanmar's chief of defense staff, General Ming
Aung Hlaing. "We have got the usual assurance of
action but we
have to wait and see,"
said a senior Indian military official who
requested anonymity.
Unlike Bhutan and
Bangladesh, both of which have cracked down hard
on northeast Indian rebel armies after years of
pressure and persuasion from India, Myanmar has
instead asked rebels to move to "safer locations"
away from its borders with India, according to
rebel sources.
Rebel leaders confirmed to
this writer that Myanmar has not cracked down
against their groups in and around Tamu, where
many from India's troubled northeastern state of
Manipur have run camps for more than two decades,
and that fighters have been allowed to move to
areas deeper inside the country.
One rebel
leader from Manipur's United National Liberation
Front (UNLF), who identified himself only as "NC",
said all top leaders of his group have "moved out"
of Tamu in the past few weeks. "I am also on my
way out," he said recently, declining to disclose
where he and other leaders of his group planned to
relocate in Myanmar. The rebel leader
moved about freely and met this writer in a Tamu
restaurant, not far away from a border checkpoint
manned by a large number of Indian and Myanmar
border guards.
Indian intelligence
officials say they have received reports that many
rebels are moving to locations along Myanmar's
border with China. This writer, however, could not
independently corroborate those claims. Another
mid-ranking leader of Manipur's separatist
People's Liberation Army (PLA), which enjoys close
relations with India's Maoist rebels, said that
"our boys have moved out" of the Tamu region.
"All our big leaders are gone and we are
also pulling out soon," the PLA rebel said,
requesting anonymity due to fear of reprisals
"from the Indian side". "The Indian intelligence
is monitoring us and Tamu is easy to enter from
[the Indian border town of] Moreh because the
border is open for locals," he said.
It
took this writer and other Manipur-based
journalists just a few minutes to receive a pass
to visit Tamu from Moreh. The two border towns are
separated by less than five kilometers and this
writer was allowed to drive a private vehicle into
Tamu. "No pictures please, leave your cameras
behind," is all that the Myanmar border guards
said, while searching the car at the check post
that is now being upgraded for anticipated higher
volumes of border trade.
Indian
intelligence officials say that not only the UNLF
and PLA but almost all other Manipur-based rebel
groups have until now maintained camps around
Tamu, a major border trade entrepot and infamous
smuggling route for narcotics and weapons from
Myanmar. There is also a robust trade in
legitimate goods, ranging from Chinese cigarettes
to Korean blankets to Burmese cheroots, at the
Namphalong market in Myanmar that straddles the
check post from Moreh into Tamu.
"The
Manipur rebel groups have had several camps around
Tamu and hundreds of their fighters were based
there for several decades. Now they have been
asked to move out but the [Myanmar] army has not
attacked them or nabbed any of their leaders,"
said an Indian federal intelligence official based
in Moreh in an interview.
He said that
many of these rebel groups run powerful extortion
rackets from Tamu and many powerful businessmen in
Manipur often visit the town to negotiate payouts
from the rebel chieftains, often over a pint of
beer and salad in local restaurants like
Waterworld.
"Now that racket may be
somewhat affected," the intelligence official
said. But more than two months after Singh's visit
to Myanmar, there is hardly any sign of a
crackdown on the Indian rebel groups that New
Delhi has long requested, he said.
During
Singh's official visit, Myanmar officials
reiterated their commitment to not allow their
soil to be used for any anti-Indian activities.
Nonetheless, the Indian delegation pushed for more
committed offensive actions against rebel groups
and were assured such security sweeps would soon
take place.
Indeed, Myanmar security
officials have cracked down on Manipur-based rebel
groups operating around Tamu only once in the last
15 years. Nearly 200 rebels, including some of the
top leaders of UNLF and PLA, were arrested by
Myanmar security forces in the winter of 1999-2000
- only to be let off without charge a few months
later.
Indian intelligence officials claim
that one-off crackdown took place because rebels
had failed to pay off sufficiently Myanmar border
guards and that once these were adequately
compensated the rebels were freed. Indian
diplomatic intervention, through the
then-ambassador in Yangon, Vivek Katju, failed to
achieve the handover or extradition of any
suspects while they were in temporary detention.
As bilateral and commercial relations have
recently warmed, India expects Myanmar's new
reformist government to deploy its security forces
against the northeast Indian rebels based in its
territory. While Myanmar leaders in the capital
make assurances that such a crackdown is imminent,
inaction on the ground speaks to an apparent
desire to maintain a buffer with Myanmar's giant
western neighbor.
Notably, other
neighboring countries have obliged India's
requests. The small mountain kingdom of Bhutan
used its army in an operation codenamed "All
Clear" to uproot rebel bases in its territory in
December 2003. Bangladesh has more recently nabbed
separatist leaders and activists and quietly
handed them over to India since the Awami League
formed the government in Dhaka in January 2009.
More than 100 separatists, including some of the
believed top guns behind northeast India's
long-running insurgency, have recently been handed
over to India.
Despite rising diplomatic
pressure, Myanmar has so far resisted such
decisive military action. "Upper Myanmar is the
last great regrouping zone for these rebels. They
have nowhere else to go," said former Indian
military intelligence official Retired Major
General Gaganjit Singh. " If Myanmar is a friend,
we want some definite action against these
rebels."
Subir Bhaumik, a known specialist on Northeast India and
Bangladesh, is a former BBC Correspondent
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