GUWAHATI, April 7: Rebels fighting Indian rule in the remote revolt-racked northeast rejected on Wednesday an offer by Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee to hold talks to resolve a decades-old insurgency. The rebels said only a referendum on the independence of tribal and ethnic groups could end the hostility.
"If India is sincere it must organize a referendum for all ethnic groups in the region on the future of their independence," Arabinda Rajkhowa, chairman of the powerful United Liberation Front of Asom (ULFA), said in a statement. -Reuters
