June 24, 2002	Monday	Rabi-us-Sani 12, 1423

GUWAHATI, India, June 23: India is planning to launch a military crackdown on separatist bases in Bhutan, Bangladesh, and Myanmar with their help, Defence Minister George Fernandes said on Sunday.

“We have prepared an action plan with the help Bhutan, Bangladesh, and Myanmar to flush out militants holed up in those countries,” he told journalists at Nagaon in central Assam.

Fernandes did not divulge details apart from saying, “the action plan would be executed soon.”

Most of the separatist groups in India’s northeast have been operating out of bases in Bhutan, Bangladesh, and Myanmar to carry out their hit-and-run guerrilla strikes on federal soldiers in Assam.

Bhutan and Myanmar have admitted the presence of Indian separatists in their countries. Bangladesh, however, denies any Indian militants were operating from their territory.

Bhutan has repeatedly urged Indian separatists to vacate the kingdom, saying the presence of Assamese militants was posing a threat to its security.

Regional government heads in India’s restive northeast have long urged New Delhi to take up the issue of “cross-border terrorism” with its neighbours.

“We have all along been telling the federal government to impress upon Bhutan and Bangladesh government’s for joint military offensives to dismantle militant camps located inside their territories,” Assam Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi told AFP.

Two of Assam’s powerful outlawed rebel armies — the United Liberation Front of Asom and the National Democratic Front of Bodoland — have bases in southern Bhutan.

Militant groups such as the National Socialist Council of Nagaland have bases in the Kachin region of Myanmar, while Tripura’s two most dreaded rebel groups, the National Liberation Front of Tripura and the All Tripura Tiger Force operate from parts of Bangladesh.

There are some 30 rebel groups active in the northeast. Their demands range from secession to greater autonomy and right to self-determination.

More than 50,000 people have lost their lives to insurgency in the region since India’s independence in 1947.—AFP