Naga Peoples Movement for Human Rights
PB# 718, II Floor K.N.Sekhose Complex
Near Hotel Fira, Jail Colony
Kohima
797001 Nagaland
Telephone: 91-(0) 370-2229356/2229357
E-mail: npmhr1 usa.net website
http// www.npmhr.org

Dimapur, 14 June 2006

The Naga Peoples Movement for Human Rights (NPMHR) condemns the position
of
the Government of India for extension of ‘Disturbed Areas Act’ and
rejection of the just demand for repealing the Armed Forces Special Powers
Act
(AFSPA); one of the most inhumane law ever legislated across the world
reflecting India’s enduring democratic deficit. NPMHR consider this
imposition of martial law provision on the Nagas and other struggling
communities, denying them of their basic human dignity under the pretense
of
‘protecting territorial integrity and promoting national security’ by
democratic India, as a serious threat to world peace and security.

The ancestry of the imposition of this AFSPA by the then newly Independent
India (supplanting the former British colonial policy under which it
suffered
immensely), has been that of the campaign to suppress the Naga national
movement in the 1950’s by brute military force through its manipulative
propaganda of quelling ‘a few misguided Naga tribesmen’ on its frontiers.
Despite the Government of India entering a formal ceasefire with the Naga
resistance since 1997 and ‘the recognition of the unique history and
situation of the Nagas’, the political process has not made significant
progress so far. In this prolonged process of ‘talking about talks’, the
Government of India has launched its massive ‘psychological warfare’
programme to further confuse and divide the people, leading to increasing
bloodshed amongst the Nagas. NPMHR cautioned the Naga public to be careful
about the questionable developmental packages dole out by the Indian
military
through its various civic contact programs under ‘Operation Good
Samaritan’. Under any Government the role of the military is to protect
national interest/borders through search, identify and destruction of the
enemy but not development which is the realm of the executive. Naga Public
should remember the many decades of bloodbath in Naga homeland and be
farsighted about its role in peace building process where many vested
interests forces are out to ‘win the hearts and mind’ of the common people
to limit our potential as a struggling nation.

NPMHR holds Government of India wholly responsible for the continuing
cases of
killings of civilians and clashes amongst the armed cadres. Even with the
existence of a loose ceasefire monitoring mechanism and rising demands for
amendment in the ground rules for effective enforcement, Government of
India
deliberately continues to ignore the efficient implementation of the
ceasefire
ground rules exacerbating the tension and multiplying the casualties among
the
Nagas. India will have no moral standing in the international community to
speak and claim itself as the largest democratic country while these
genocidal
policies continues to be perpetrated in its so called backyard occupied
north
east and the Naga homeland.

NPMHR considers India’s quest for positions in international forum such as
UN Council of Human rights and the UN Security Council as serious
deception
due to its dismal human rights record in Naga homeland and possesses grave
threat to minority and indigenous peoples struggling for basic human
security
and the recognition of their right to self determination.

NPMHR demands that India ratify the Rome statute on the International
Criminal
Court (ICC) with universal jurisdiction over cases of genocide, crime
against
humanity, war crimes, torture, extrajudicial executions and disappearance;
which will strengthen her assertion as a functional democracy to maintain
accountability and transparency towards its commitment to the various
international Human rights treaties it had ratified so far. The AFSPA
promotes
impunity by allowing torture, extrajudicial executions and disappearance,
besides many other forms of human rights violations leaving behind a huge
‘Accountability gap’ leading to destruction of our common humanity and
dignity.

NPMHR appeals to the Government of India to demonstrate sincerity and
commitment to the Indo-Naga peace process by repealing the draconian Armed
Forces Special Powers Act and restoration of democratic space to Nagas and
other struggling communities. How can structures of violence coexist with
the
genuine commitment in the search for peace, unless those structures are
dismantled? Is the Government of India ruling the Nagas through their
free
express informed consent or imposing their authority by substituting the
powers of the state through repression and manipulation, for the consent
of
the people? India’s governing of Naga homeland has so far relied on a
system
of repressive legislation overseen by a complaint judiciary and enforced
by
(its) military forces. Without scrapping this anti-democratic legislation
from
the statute books, there is no hope for dignified survival and unless
Government of India listens to the common cry of the people and
constructively
creates space for democratic values to re-emerge, it is tantamount to
diminishing its own avowed principles of participatory democracy and
non-violence.

NPMHR asserts that if Nagas continues to be excluded from a
rights-creating
process, the only way to realize more attention and understanding will
‘depend on our organized and persistent acts of defiance and resistance to
this annihilation processes’. NPMHR appeal to the Naga Public, solidarity
groups in India and the international community to rise up against this
anti-peoples legislation for the larger interest of just peace and global
security as ‘violation of human rights in any part of the world is a
threat
to the human race as a whole and protection and promotion of human rights
is
the concern for all’.

Nepuni Piku
Secretary General, NPMHR

"Violation of human rights in any part of the world is a threat to the
human race as a whole and protection and promotion of human rights anywhere is a
concern of all."