ITANAGAR, 6 Dec: The Manab Adhikar Sangram Samiti (MASS) has condemned the “brutal and senseless murder” of innocent Naga wage earners and their protesting allies by the Indian armed forces.
“Even as our region prepares for the season of peace and festivities, special forces of the Indian Army ambushed and killed young Naga men returning home to their village from working on the coal mines in Mon district,” it said.
“This event is a reminder of the generational trauma that
the people of the Northeast, including the Nagas, continue to be subjected to,” the organization said.
It said that the government of India must repeal the AFSPA immediately and without any prevarication and there should be an impartial inquiry conducted by a sitting judge.
“The guilty army personnel must be tried for premeditated murder in a court of law. Their names and designations should be made public, and the Indian armed forces should dismiss them from service to face the law as common citizens,” it said, adding that the families of the dead and the injured must receive maximum compensation.
While welcoming the formation of a special investigation team to inquire into the incident, it said that “the organization wishes to sound a cautionary note about the fate of other investigations and commissions of inquiry following excesses committed by the armed forces against civilians in Northeast India.
“The Justice KN Saikia Committee report on extrajudicial executions in Assam and the Justice Upendra Singh Committee report on the killing of Thangjam Manorama have not been acted upon and are yet to see the light of day,” the MASS said.
“The Naga people were supposed to be safer following a ceasefire agreed upon by Naga armed opposition groups and the government of India in 1997. Instead, they have continued to suffer under threats made against them by the Indian security forces, who hide behind the grotesque law called the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act or AFSPA, 1958,” it added.
