GUWAHATI: The security forces hit back at the militants on Sunday, gunning down two of them, hours after they had killed two Assam Rifles personnel in an ambush along Assam-Arunachal Pradesh border.
The police said the militants had triggered IED and grenade blasts and fired indiscriminately from sophisticated weapons while laying the ambush on a road opening party (ROP) of the Assam Rifles.
Two personnel, who were critically injured, succumbed to their injuries later.
Assam’s Director General of Police, Mukesh Sahay, told Express that the Coordination Committee (CorCom), which is an umbrella body of Manipuri insurgent groups, had carried out the attack with the backing of the SS Khaplang faction of National Socialist Council of Nagaland (NSCN-K) and the Paresh Baruah faction of United Liberation Front of Assam (ULFA).
“A team of Assam Rifles personnel was on an ROP duty when it came under attack from the rebels. Two personnel were killed in the incident. Later, the security forces neutralized two extremists,” Sahay said.
When reports last came in, the security forces were conducting combing operations against the militants. Defence sources said the operations would continue till Sunday midnight or Monday morning.
After the ambush, hundreds of tourists, most of who were headed to Pangsau festival near India-Myanmar border in Arunachal, were stuck up on National Highway 153 between Nampong in Changlang district of Arunachal and Jagun in Assam. Sahay said the road would be opened soon following sanitization.
The tourists were stranded there for hours together without food, water and toilet facilities.
Meanwhile, claiming responsibility of the ambush, the CorCom and the Paresh Baruah faction of ULFA in a joint statement expressed “gratitude to the joint team for their brave action against the Indian security forces, to the commander of joint tactical operations centre for this successful operation and to fraternal organisations and the locals for their help”.
This was the fourth ambush by militants on security forces in the Northeast in recent months. On December 4, a JCO was among two Assam Rifles personnel killed in an ambush by the NSCN-K in Arunachal. On November 19, a combined team of NSCN-K and ULFA had carried out an ambush on Army personnel in Assam, killing three and injuring four others. This was followed by another ambush on a group of 21 Para commandos in Manipur on November 26. Five Army personnel were injured in that attack.
Many insurgent outfits of the Northeast have their bases in Myanmar. A number of them have come under one umbrella after the formation of United National Liberation Front of Western South East Asia. Ever since its formation, they started carrying out the attacks jointly.