Source: Hueiyen News Service
Imphal, January 20 2009:
LIKE IN the pass years, four separatist outfits in the north eastern region of the country have called general strike on January 26 as part of boycott to the country's Republic Day celebration.
Four insurgent groups from the north-east India -- the banned United Liberation Front of Asom, Manipur People's Liberation Front, Tripura People's Democratic Front and Kamatapur Liberation Organisation today announced the general strike effective from 1 am to 6 pm of the day to register their protest against 'Indian colonial occupation of the region'.
In a joint statement e-mailed to the media on Sunday, the four insurgent groups of the region said the general strike has been imposing to prevent celebrations of Indian Republic Day and appealed to the 'revolutionary people of the region' to extend support to their stand.
In a statement signed by the chairman of the ULFA Arabinda Rajkhowa also appealed other insurgent groups in the region maintaining ceasefire packed or on peace talks with the India government to come back to the path of revolution for the sake of greater regional unity.
The statement said, "We are pained to note that the liberation forces in the region remain divided into two lines -- those in 'ceasefire' and 'peace talk' process with India on one line, and those actively continuing armed struggle against India on the other" .
"The imposition of Indian constitution in the region completes 59 years this 26 January.
During this period, scores of thousands of our peoples have been killed, tortured, maimed and hundreds of our womenfolk have been raped by the Indian Occupation Forces.
India has not shown any respect for the human rights, rather human values, of the peoples of the Region," the statement alleged.
It also said that it is a genuine and legitimate aspirations of all the peoples and ethnic groups of the region and it could not be observed that the reorganization of the region under the constitution of India is actually a colonial policy of 'divide and rule' and has created a myriad of ethnic frictions and conflicts thereby undermining the basic unity of the region.
"The Indian Constitution has artificially divided our peoples by classifying them as 'tribes', 'castes', 'OBCs', etc., etc.
thus pitching them as contending opponents in the societies concerned," said the statement adding that this has not only created antagonistic contradictions among the fraternal peoples but has also degraded the value of individual and collective life.