Source: Hueiyen News Service / Agencies
New Delhi, December 12 2009:
Despite the recent arrest of Arabinda Rajkhowa, the government's chances of laying hands on his boss and ULFA chief Paresh Baruah are getting worse.
The government has received definite information from intelligence agencies that Chinese agencies have helped Baruah set up base in China's Yunnan province bordering Myanmar.
Sources in the home ministry had earlier confirmed that Baruah was based in Kachin province of Myanmar, very close to Yunnan.
The Chinese agencies, in fact, are said to have used the ongoing conflict and lawlessness in northern Myanmar to help Baruah set up base in the region.
"The information has left no doubt that Chinese agencies are creating space for him in the region to carry out his activities," said a highly placed government official, adding that Baruah was now mostly based on the Chinese side of the border even though he frequents northern Myanmar.
That Baruah might have sneaked into China has been a subject of intense speculation in the recent past.
Now, however, there is corroboration by intelligence agencies that Baruah has not just entered Chinese territory but is also being helped by the Chinese to carry out his activities.
Before shifting base, Baruah had been living in Bangladesh since 1990 under the assumed name of Kamruj Zaman Khan.
The official, however, refused to blame the Myanmar government for allowing Baruah to have a free run.
"It's a well known fact that Myanmar's military government has little control in northern areas bordering
Yunnan province.
These areas are controlled by tribal chiefs and ethnic groups and the Chinese have taken advantage of this to help Baruah set up base in the region," said the official, adding that some of the Chinese agencies active in the area seemed closely associated with a few think tanks affiliated to the Communist Party of China.
According to information available with the government, the Chinese agencies have nursed "low-level contacts" in the region and these have been put to use in ensuring safety of Baruah.
Northern Myanmar in the recent past has seen intense conflict with the Myanmar army launching a crackdown on ethnic militias, many of whom are of Chinese origin.
The situation led to a minor diplomatic row in September with the Chinese foreign ministry summoning a Myanmar diplomat to lodge a protest against the treatment meted out to ethnic Chinese in northern Myanmar.
Meanwhile, the outlawed United Liberation Front of Assam's (ULFA) commander-in-chief Paresh Barua on Friday called upon the government to either hold dialogue on the issue of sovereignty or hold a "plebiscite" to resolve the three-decade-old "India-Assam conflict".
Barua, who e-mailed a statement to newspaper offices here on Friday said the Government of India must hold talks with the ULFA on the issue of sovereignty.
"The colonial Indian government must hold taks with ULFA on the issues of sovereignty and independence of Assam.
There is no alternative to this," he said.
"If the Indian govenment is not capable of doing this, then let the freedom-aspiring indigenous people of Assam decide their fate through a plebiscite.
The Indian government cannot continue to deprive the sons of the soil in Assam of their birthright (freedom) on the pretext of what is written in the so-called Indian Constitution," he said.