Source: The Sangai Express / PTI
New Delhi, January 07:
Setting the political tone for his visit to the country, NSCN-IM general secretary Th Muivah has met Congress President Sonia Gandhi and expressed a desire to meet Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to strengthen the peace process in Nagaland.
The meeting between Gandhi and Muivah yesterday was arranged at the latter's request, official sources said.
Details about their discussions were not immediately available, but Muivah is understood to have expressed concern at attacks on NSCN-IM cadres in Nagaland by rival groups like the Khaplang faction of NSCN and NNC, which was dormant till recently, the sources said.
Muivah is scheduled to travel to Nagaland to join chairman Isak Chisi Swu, who arrived last week but shelved his plan to meet the leaders of the Central Govt to raise concerns about the tense situation in Nagaland due to the factional clashes.
Muivah approached Union Labour Minister Oscar Fernandes, who heads the Group of Ministers engaged in talks with NSCN-Im leaders, and sought a meeting with the PM.
No assurance has been given about a meeting so far, and it would depend on the Prime Minister's schedule, the sources said.
Muivah's meetings with political leaders bears significance in view of assembly elections scheduled to be held in Manipur in February.
Four hill districts of Manipur are dominated by Naga tribes.
The sources said the NSCN-IM had expressed "utmost surprise" at attacks on its cadres by the NPP, an organisation which dominated the Naga movement in its early stages but had become virtually defunct over the decades.
The NSCN-IM is pressing for the integration of Naga-inhabited areas of Manipur, Arunachal Pradesh and Assam with Nagaland.
Muivah and Swu will stay in India for about two months, sources said.
The NSCN-IM agreed to a ceasefire with the Centre in August 1997.The two sides have held numerous rounds of talks within India and abroad since 1997.