Volume 1, No. 10, December 2000

Hypocrisy has its limits. The Indian rulers have been crying themselves hoarse at every international forum, for action against military dictatorships. Yet, in mid-November, it accorded a royal welcome to a high-power delegation of the Myanmar military junta.

Hardly six months ago, India’s representatives had argued vehemently at the forum of the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) for the expulsion of military regimes that had seized power by ousting democratic governments. At the Commonwealth Conference it had vociferously demanded the ouster of Pakistan after the military coup. It has made a big show of opposing the military junta in Fiji which seized power through the ouster of Mahendra Chowdhury’s government. It was one of the co-convenors, with the USA, at a conference of democracies held in Poland, where it waxed eloquent about democracies and need to isolate military juntas from world bodies.

But, this military junta of Myanmar, itself came to power through a coup in 1990, after arresting Aung San Sue Kyi, who had won 80% of the votes in an election. Yet, while Indian representatives at NAM barked about the "expulsion of military regimes that had seized power by ousting democratic governments", it rolled out the red carpet to Mynmar’s No.2 leader, General Maung Aye. This visiting vice-chairman of Myanmar’s State Peace and Development Organisation, was welcomed at the Rashtrapati Bhavan, in a ceremony usually reserved for visits by Heads of State.

This General, together with his 16 member delegation met not only all top ministers, but also had talks with the Indian Army. He had detailed discussions with Advani, centering around counter-insurgency operations in the North East. Advani proudly announced that Myanmar had helped smash 5 camps of the NSCN (Khaplang). While cooperation in counter-insurgency against the North East freedom fighters was the focus of India’s discussions with the Generals, economic cooperation, specifically in the field of oil and natural gas, was also discussed. Joint projects in the field of hydel power, road construction were discussed, as also the creation of a network of pipelines passing through Myanmar and along the territory of Bangladesh into India. Trade between Myanmar and India has increased from $13 million in 1980/81 to $194 million in 1999-2000.

The Indian rulers have a two-fold perspective in throwing away principles to the wind and establishing close cooperation with the generals. First, it seeks to use Myanmar’s assistance for counter-insurgency operations in the North East, particularly against rebel camps on Myanmar territory. Second, it sees Myanmar as a door to East Asia; and it seeks to link the economic exploitation of the North East (after pacification of the insurgencies) to the markets of East Asia. The key factor in the first is to subdue the Naga national movement using a combination of armed suppression and peace talks .... utilising the assistance of Myanmar. In the second, it seeks to restart oil exploration, tourism and other development, and link this with road contact through Myanmar to other countries of East Asia.

Let us look at the two aspects.

The Indo-Myanmar border is 1,600 km long. Building a network of cross-border roads in this region is an important aspect of the counter-insurgency operations. India has already completed a 165 km road stretching from Tamu in India to Kalemyo in Myanmar. This road will be inaugurated next month and will connect upto India’s national highway, which terminates at Moreh in Manipur. The establishment of a cross-border network will facilitate both countries counter insurgencies. Besides, during this visit, India offered development assistance to Myanmar in the form of upgrading road communication and railway systems in the Kachin state and Chin state. The military rulers of Myanmar have been facing armed insurgencies in these two areas for decades.

The importance given to Myanmar in counter-insurgency operations can be seen from the fact that, a few months back, the earlier Army Chief of Staff, Malik, himself payed a visit to Yangoon to plan operations against the militants. During the current visit the General and Advani also planned methods on how to share intelligence.

Their main focus has been targeted at the strongest and oldest movement in the region — the Naga National movement. While conducting peace talks with the National Socialist Council of Nagaland (Isak-Muivah), at the same time the Indian rulers were planning with the Generals on how to crush it. In fact a few days before the General’s visit to India, the Centre put its defence forces in Nagaland on full alert, following the possible breakdown of talks with the NSCN(I-M).

Constant double-dealing, treachery and underhand methods by the Indian rulers is resulting in the Nagas losing their patience. Amidst the peace talks, which have now been dragging on for over three years (since the ceasefire was signed on July 25, ’97), the Centre announced on November 1, a new rehabilitation scheme for surrendered militants. It declared that any Naga surrendering with at least one weapon, will be given vocational training, a 12-month stipend and a cash incentive. If it is serious on reaching a political settlement through peace talks, why should it seek the surrender of NSCN(I-M) activists. It shows that the Indian rulers seek to use the peace initiative to diffuse the movement, and force a surrender, rather than reach a political settlement.

Also, while Muivah was arrested in Bangkok (for entering the country on a forged passport from Karachi in January 2000), the Indian authorities began portraying him as a terrorist, and instructed its embassy in Bangkok to ensure that Muivah was detained in jail as long as possible. On being released on bail recently, Muivah stated that "the intelligence agencies and bureaucrats in India think, instead of seeing this as an opportunity for political settlement, view it as an opportunity to divide the Nagas."

BJP double-dealing reached to such an extent, that its main representative at the peace talks, Swaraj Kaushal (Sushma Swaraj’s husband), resigned in March 2000. While resigning he accused Vajpayee of not keeping to his word and backtracking on assurances given in the talks. Such treachery by the Indian rulers is the norm, and what is disclosed here is only the tip of the iceberg. It is then not surprising that the Indian government grew panicky when it gathered that the NSCN(I-M) was negotiating a major arms deal with a Chinese arms-manufacturing firm, based in Beijing.

It is then that they ordered the military alert and simultaneously dispatched the Mizoram Chief minister, Zonamthanga, as the Prime Minister’s emissary for the peace talks. By end November he had held four rounds of talks in Bangkok with Muivah and Isak Swu. He claimed that the road-blocks to the Naga peace talks had been removed.

The Indian government is desperate for ‘peace’ in the North East, not to meet the just aspirations of the people there, but to make it a conducive hunting ground for the loot by the imperialists and comprador bourgeoisie. This they seek to achieve by, suppressing the freedom struggles, and by tying the region to the markets of East Asia.

Already the ONGC (Oil and Natural Gas Commission) has been asked to resume oil exploration in Nagaland. Nagaland is rich in oil deposits and could provide India with as much as 4.5 million barrels of crude oil per year — i.e., 15% of its present indigenous production.

In 1994 the Nagaland government had ordered the ONGC to stop work, when the latter had drilled 25 wells and was producing 250 tonnes of crude per day. The reason was disputes over royalty payments and attacks on oil rigs by the NSCN(I-M). As land in Nagaland is held communally, the Nagas demanded that royalty payments should not be made to the state government, but to the tribal heads. To firm up this demand the NSCN(I-M) burnt down two rigs.

Besides developing this region, it plans to tie up the North East in a network of pipe lines that will bring oil and natural gas from Myanmar and Bangladesh to India. In addition, there are major schemes to develop tourism in the entire region.

As part of these plans two agreements have been signed. In June 1997 the regional grouping, BIMST-EC (Bangladesh-India-Myanmar-Sri Lanka-Thailand Econo- mic Cooperation) was formed. And now, on November 10, 2000, a ministerial delegation from the six Asian countries of India, Myanmar, Thailand, Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam gathered at the Laotian capital of Vientiane, to launch the Mekong-Ganga Cooperation. The MGC, a loose grouping that aims to focus attention on cooperation in the areas of tourism, culture, education, communica- tions between India and the five Mekong river basin countries, has been planned since the last one year.

The Declaration stated that they will conduct "strategic studies" for the joint marketing and convening missions for tourism marketing, launch a Mekong-Ganga tourism guide, facilitate the travel of people in the region, expand multi-model communication and transport linkages and also promote package tours to cultural, religious and eco-tourism sites of the region. In the field of transport and communications, it has decided to make efforts to develop transport networks, in particular the "East-West" corridor project and the Trans-Asian highway. In other words, convert the entire region into a hunting ground for foreign tourists.

India’s participation in the above projects can only be done through the North East due to the geographical contiguity of the region with the East Asian countries (See map). The fact that the Indian rulers have gone ahead with such two high profile multilateral agreements means that they are urgently planning ‘peace’, at all costs, in the North East. They will seek to achieve this ‘peace’ either through surrender of the freedom movements there, or through their brutal suppression. The peoples of the North East must beware of the intrigues and manipulations of the Indian rulers. Their just struggle for self-determination, including secession from the Indian expansionist ruling classes, enjoys abundant support from the democratic minded people of India.

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