New Delhi, August 8: Manipur Chief Minister Okram Ibobi Singh Saturday demanded details of the Naga peace accord signed between the Centre and the NSCN-IM from home minister Rajnath Singh. During a meeting with Rajnath Singh here, Ibobi Singh said the people of Manipur were anxious to know the details of the Naga peace accord and had apprehensions that it would affect the territorial integrity of the state, an official statement said.
RN Ravi, the Central government’s interlocutor for the Naga peace talks, was also present at the meeting held at Rajnath Singh’s residence. The home minister told Ibobi Singh that the accord was just a framework. “It would not affect the territorial boundary of the neighbouring states of Nagaland. He (Rajnath Singh) further stated that the government of India would invite the state governments for discussion while working out the final shape of the accord,” the statement said. Ibobi Singh later met Prime Minister Narendra Modi at his residence. Modi assured the Manipur Chief Minister “that everything would be discussed with the state governments concerned before finalisation of the accord”.
In a joint press conference Friday here attended by the Chief Ministers of three Congress-ruled northeastern states — Nabam Tuki of Arunachal Pradesh, Tarun Gogoi of Assam, and Ibobi Singh of Manipur — the Congress charged the Centre with not taking these three states bordering Nagaland into confidence before signing the accord. All the three states have raised apprehensions about the implications of the accord. The National Socialist Council of Nagaland (Isak-Muivah) had demanded that Naga-inhabited areas of these three states should be brought within the ambit of a ‘Greater Nagalim’. The Central government and the NSCN-IM August 3 signed the historic accord that promises to bring peace in the northeastern state ravaged by violence for over six decades.
Meanwhile, The Naga peace accord will not bypass the interests of other states sharing boundaries with Nagaland, union MoS for home Kiren Rijiju said in Guwahati Saturday. “The CMs of the three northeastern states – Assam, Manipur and Arunachal Pradesh – have initially welcomed the Naga peace accord. Later, they took a U-turn on the issue,” Rijiju said. “The CMs are making contradictory statements on the direction of (Congress chief) Sonia Gandhi which was not a good sign,” he said while appealing to the Congress not to politicise the issue. IANS
