Correspondent
IMPHAL, MAY 11: Coordinating Committee on Manipur Integrity (COCOMI) on Monday reiterated that the recent attacks at three villages in Manipur’s Kamjong district was an armed aggression from across the Indo-Myanmar border.
In a statement, the COCOMI said that the incidents that unfolded in the border villages of Kamjong district were not imaginary narratives or politically manufactured claims, but direct acts of armed aggression carried out by heavily armed groups operating from across the International Border in Myanmar. The statement was issued following a recent press note issued by KOHUR (Kuki Organisation for Human Rights Trust).
The COCOMI had alleged the recent attacks were purely cross-border armed aggression by foreign-based groups against Indian citizens which KOHUR reacted while terming as “misleading” narrative. The KOHUR’s attempt to discredit the statement of COCOMI regarding the terrorist attacks in Kamjong district was deeply unfortunate, misleading, and detached from the ground realities faced by the people residing along the Indo-Myanmar border, the COCOMI said.
Reiterating that the narrative by COCOMI was not imaginary narratives or politically manufactured claims, the apex body asserted that local representatives, including the sitting MLA of the affected region, had openly acknowledged the involvement of KNA (Burma) in the attacks.
The presence of cross border narco-terrorist groups within the Indian Territory was also acknowledged by a statement issued by the PRO & spokesperson of the Union ministry regarding the rescue operation of a Naga woman villager from Namlee and arrest of another KNA(B) operatives namely Lal Thag John (38) along with arms and ammunition from Churachandpur.
The alleged KOHUR’s attempts to distort or selectively suppress these facts only exposed their continued pattern of shielding and whitewashing violent elements instead of standing for genuine human rights and justice, the apex body said. COCOMI stated that its recent statement merely articulated the grave security concerns emerging from repeated cross-border infiltration, armed incursions, and coordinated attacks affecting Indian citizens residing in the border areas of Manipur. “Labeling these concerns as “communal” or attempting to trivialize them is an insult to the affected villagers who have continuously lived under fear and insecurity due to unchecked militant movements along the porous international boundary,” it added.
COCOMI also accused the KOHUR of invoking the language of human rights only when it suits their narrative, while remaining conspicuously silent on the repeated attacks, intimidation, extortion, displacement, and violence faced by indigenous communities in the border regions despite being a pseudo human rights group.