ZoRO to celebrate World Indigenous Day
Source: Hueiyen News Service
Lamka, July 09 2014:
Zo Re-unification Organisation (ZoRO) has said that Zo Indigenous Nation's Rights were deprived of by the British who ruled the Zo people by applying divide
and rule policy.
At a press conference convened by ZoRO General Headquarters today at Kuki Students' Organization information office at Sumkong Kaimun Tuibuing, Churachandpur, the Zo Re-unification Organisation iterated that it is an affiliated organization under United Nations People Forum on indigenous Issues (UNPFII) with the aim of re-unifying the politically scattered Zo people.
ZoRO Northern Speaker Simte said the organization will be celebrating World Indigenous Day on August 9 at Lunglei district Aizawl, Mizoram under the aegis of Mizo Zillai Pawl (MZP) Lunglei and ZoRO Southern Zone, adding that the celebration will be graced by Romawia Minister Art & Culture, Government of Mizoram as the chief Guest.
He informed that delegates from ZoRO Zones and divisions, intellectuals and leaders of Zo Indigenous people across the globe will take part in the programme, while cultural troops from Chittagong Hill Tracts, Saiha and Lawngtlai districts will show-case cultural dances on the occasion.
Saying that the Zomi have been striving for re-unification, ZoRO recalled that Mizo National Front took up arms in 1966 and fought for their cause for a long period of twenty years (1866-1986) during which many people died, tortured, raped, and many houses were burnt down.
He further said many innocent people suffered and many villages were uprooted and re-grouped without assistance under concentration camps and many died of starvation.
Leaders of ZoRO informed about these horrible incidents to leaders of human rights commission, and in turn they requested the organisation to submit reports of such suffering and atrocities to the Amnesty International, the ZoRO said.
The British understood that Zo people are one community and intended to put them under one administrative head, on the basis of Chin-Lushai Conference resolution held on January 28,1892, in Forth William, Calcutta.
When India and Pakistan got independence in 1947 and Burma in 1948, British government left the Zo Indigenous people without fulfilling their decision and Zo people living along Indo-Bangladesh-Myanmar frontier region were separated into three sovereign countries, the ZoRO further added.