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SOUTH ASIA INTELLIGENCE REVIEW
Weekly Assessments & Briefings
Volume 14, No. 6, August 10, 2015

Data and assessments from SAIR can be freely published in any form with credit to the South Asia Intelligence Review of the
South Asia Terrorism Portal


ASSESSMENT

INDIA
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Nagaland: Tentative Accord
Ajai Sahni
Editor, SAIR; Executive Director, Institute for Conflict Management & South Asia Terrorism Portal

A ‘historic accord’ was signed between the Government of India and the largest rebel Naga group, the National Socialist Council of Nagalim – Isak Muivah (NSCN-IM) on August 3, 2015, at once raising hopes and apprehensions against the context of what has been India’s most enduring insurgency. While few details of the actual contents of the agreement are yet available, the Centre’s principal interlocutor R.N. Ravi has clarified that the ‘accord’ is, in fact, a “framework agreement” that spells out the terms of a “final settlement”. Reports suggest that such a final settlement would be worked out in three months, and would exclude any claims to sovereignty or alterations in state boundaries.

There can be little doubt that, coming after nearly 18 years of negotiations under ceasefire, this accord has major significance. That it has happened under the leadership of the Narendra Modi Government, with R.N. Ravi as the Centre’s interlocutor, and National Security Advisor Ajit Doval guiding the process, the credit will naturally go to the current dispensation. Nevertheless, it is useful to recognize that this is, at best, a no doubt big step in a journey on which several successive regimes had already covered many miles.

A release issued by the Prime Minister’s office on August 3, 2015, claimed that the Agreement would “end the oldest insurgency in the country… restore peace and pave the way for prosperity in the Northeast”, that it made an “honourable settlement” possible”, and that the “NSCN was represented by its entire collective leadership and senior leaders of various Naga tribes.”

The August 3 Agreement is far from a conclusive resolution of the ‘Naga problem’. There are still several armed factions that will need to be accommodated before the ‘Nagaland problem’ can be said to have been ‘resolved’, and at least some of these will be tempted to escalate violence in the immediate future, partially to increase their ‘leverage’ in future negotiations, and partly to occupy the militant ‘space’ purportedly vacated  by NSCN-IM’s accord.

The Congress party has launched a campaign of rather strident, churlish and at least occasionally mischievous criticism of the accord, with party President Sonia Gandhi declaring that, since the ‘States had not been taken into confidence’, the accord was ‘insulting to the States and people of the Northeast’. The reality is, while details of the accord are yet to be disclosed, it is unlikely to deviate substantially from the underlying principles established under previous regimes, and would essentially reflect a continuity of efforts. Over 80 rounds of talks have been held between the Government and NSCN-IM leadership over the past 18 years. Through this process, the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) Government led by the Congress did not ‘take the States into confidence’ any more than the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) regime has, and that is the nature of such negotiations. The accord is expected to contain the basic provisions that have crystallized over the past years, specifically, that the immediate deal will relate only to the territory of Nagaland, and that other territorial claims of the ‘greater Nagalim’ will be resolved consensually through dialogue with the neighbouring states. It is likely that the deal will pave the way to an election where the NSCN-IM or a successor political party will be facilitated to secure power through polls. The Congress party’s problem is sour grapes, because they weren’t able to push the deal to a conclusion during their tenure – though they were many occasions when a settlement was believed to be tantalizingly within reach.

There are, nevertheless, several aspects of the present Agreement that are troubling. Among these are the circumstances under which it is said to have been signed. The process is said to have been accelerated on the request of Isak Chisi Swu, NSCN-IM ‘chairman’, who is critically ill in a Delhi hospital, and wished to see the agreement signed in his lifetime, with several unsettled issues papered over.

At least some of this is already coming to the fore. Thus, NSCN-IM ‘kilo kilonser’ (‘home minister’) R.H. Raising has asserted, “we have agreed to share sovereign power with each other” and that “integration will be in the (final) agreement”. The ‘integration’ of all Naga dominated areas in neighbouring States is a sore point that led to widespread violence in Manipur in 2001, simply because the ceasefire with the NSCN-IM had been extended “without territorial limits”, an arrangement that had to be quickly reversed thereafter.

Further disturbing the projection of a wide consensus, Joyson Mazamo, Member Secretary of the Committee on Naga Political Affairs (CONPA) of the Naga Hoho, the influential apex body of the Naga tribes, insisted that “The IM group does not represent the entire Nagas” though he conceded that the group “enjoyed popular support.” However, he argued “We want integration and want all arbitrary boundaries removed.” The Naga National Council’s (NNC’s) President, Adino Phizo has declared, “Nagas are not Indians and Nagaland is not Indian territory”. Similar statements reflecting skepticism or hostility have come from a number of political formations.

There will, moreover, be renewed ferment among various armed Naga factions. The ‘final agreement’ with NSCN-IM would naturally and overwhelmingly favour this group and, at the same time, vacate a vast dissenting space which other groups – most significantly NSCN-K, but also the lesser formations, such as NSCN-Khole Kitovi,  NSCN-Reformation, NSCN-Reunification, Naga National Council (NNC), Zeliangrong United Front and Zeliangrong Revolutionary Army, among others – will attempt to occupy. The contours of the final arrangement are already crystallizing, with Nagaland Chief Minister T.R. Zeliang declaring “I along with all members of the Nagaland Assembly are ready to step down, if an acceptable and honourable solution is found to the Naga people (sic), in order to make a new beginning.”

This is unlikely to satisfy the many other armed factions that are jostling for a place on the high table. NSCN-IM’s most irreconcilable adversary, NSCN-Khaplang, has already rejected the deal, with Niki Sumi, its ‘military supervisor (west)’, asserting that it was the ‘sole prerogative’ of NSCN-IM to ‘arrive at any kind of conclusion’ and was intended ‘exclusively’ for that group. Sumi declared, further, that the Nagas’ struggle for ‘sovereignty was an international political conflict between nations”, that “we do not recognize international boundaries” and insisted on ‘the intrinsic ideal of a compact Naga nation comprising every Naga-inhabited area as historically established.’

The NSCN-IM is, of course, by far the largest of armed factions, with an estimated cadre strength in 2012 of 5,600 based in nine designated camps in Nagaland. Another 100 cadres are located across the border in the Chittagong Hill Tract (CHT) region of Bangladesh. While the group has not engaged in violent activities targeting civilians or SF personnel for some time, one clash in December 2013 resulted in two civilian fatalities, and three Army personnel were killed and four were wounded in an ambush on April 2, 2015, in which NSCN-IM cadres are suspected to be involved. Nevertheless, the group has been involved in relentless turf wars with NSCN-K and, increasingly, with ZUF. Other Naga factions have had violent mutual rivalries, and there is little reason to believe that a quick consensus can be reached if the Centre is able to resolve its problems with NSCN-IM.

Further, the possibilities of a split within IM cannot be ruled out. IM was, itself, born out of a peace deal: the Shillong Accord with NNC in 1975, which some elements refused to accept, and came to create the then unified NSCN. When the loaves and cakes have been distributed, there will be many who feel they have lost out; it remains to be seen what they would do. The NSCN-IM does not represent the consensual leadership of all Naga tribes, and it is useful to recall that S.S. Khaplang broke away from the unified NSCN in 1988 along tribal fault lines, then claiming leadership of the Hemi, Ao and Konyak Nagas; even as the ZUF and ZRA were created in 2011 to represent the Zeme, Liangmai and Rongmei Nagas. Isak Chisi Swu is a Sema Naga with his principal support base among his own tribesmen, while Thuingaleng Muivah has his political roots among the Thangkul tribe; the NSCN-IM leadership is far from representative of the kaleidoscope of Naga tribes, of which 35 are listed among the Scheduled Tribes under Article 342 of the Constitution, and this has often given rise to resentment.

Things are also likely to come to a head on the question of dismantling the NSCN-IM camps, of demobilizing and disarming its armed cadre, and of terminating the parallel ‘security’, ‘administration’ and ‘taxation’ networks long operated by NSCN-IM. Crucially, IM cadres are likely to plead that, unless all other Naga groups are disarmed, they will need to retain their capacities to defend themselves. Such a position, however, would lead to a perpetuation of an unacceptable status quo on the ground.

The deal with the NSCN-IM is also of critical importance for the insurgencies across the Northeast, because the group had become an opportunistic facilitator for a number of other insurgent formations in the region, and all these will suffer as a consequence of the loss of underground support from the IM faction. This may, however, mean that Khaplang will gain in influence. Nevertheless, the much larger infrastructure and capacities of the IM group would now, hopefully, be lost to the other surviving insurgencies in the region as well.

The peace process in Nagaland has dragged on for decades and has produced a succession of imperfect settlements. The NSCN-Reformation group, while welcoming the Centre’s accord with NSCN-IM with “high hopes” cautioned against to the “vast experience of failed accords and agreements in the past”. This tempered optimism is the only rational approach to perhaps the most complex and intractable of internal conflicts in India.

BANGLADESH
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Islamist Backlash, Measured Justice
S. Binodkumar Singh
Research Associate, Institute for Conflict Management

On August 7, 2015, Niladri Chattopadhyay Niloy alias Niloy Neel (28), a secular blogger and a Gonojagoron Mancha (People's Resurgence Platform) activist was hacked to death at his Goran residence in the Khilgaon area of the national capital, Dhaka, in broad daylight. Later in the evening, a group identifying itself as Ansar-al-Islam, Bangladesh chapter of Al-Qaeda in the Indian Sub-continent (AQIS), claimed responsibility for the murder in an email sent out to almost all media outlets. The email declared: “Alhamdulillah! Mujahidin of Ansar-al-Islam (AQIS, Bangladesh Branch) carried out an operation to slaughter an enemy of Allah and His Messenger (peace & blessings be upon him), whose name is Niloy Chowdhury Neel.”

Niloy is the fourth blogger to be killed in 2015 by suspected Islamist terrorists. Earlier suspected extremists had killed three secular bloggers and writers in three separate incidents: on May 12, 2015, Ananta Bijoy Das (32), a progressive writer, blogger, editor of science fiction magazine Jukti, and an organizer of Gonojagoron Mancha, was hacked to death, using machetes, by four assailants at Subidbazar Bankolapara residential area of Sylhet city in Sylhet District; on March 30, 2015, another blogger and online activist, Oyasiqur Rahman Babu (27), was hacked to death in broad daylight in Dhaka city for his allegedly atheist views; and on February 26, 2015, Bangladesh-born American citizen blogger Avijit Roy (42), the founder of the Mukta-mona.com blog, was hacked to death in Dhaka city. Investigations into these cases later confirmed that that Ansarullah Bangla Team (ABT, Volunteer of Allah Bangla Team), a terrorist outfit linked with AQIS, organized the killing of these writers for their position ‘against Islam’.

These killings are, in some measure, a reaction to the assertiveness demonstrated by the Government led by Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina Wajed, as a result of which the threat from Islamist terrorism in Bangladesh has been minimized. Significantly, various Islamist terrorist and extremist formations had been operating menacingly across the country before Wajed coming to power in 2009. The Government’s sustained efforts, since, have led to widespread anxiety among the extremists, who now find their very existence under threat.

The speed and efficacy of the War Crimes Trials (WCTs) is another worrying factor for the radicals within Bangladesh, who once enjoyed state support under the predecessor regime led by Begum Khaleda Zia. Significantly, on August 5, 2015, the International Crimes Tribunal-1 (ICT-1) fixed August 11 for the delivery of its verdict in the case against two of the three Razakar (an auxiliary force of the Pakistan Army during the Liberation War) leaders – Sheikh Sirajul Haque alias Siraj Kosai and Khan Akram Hossain – for genocidal crimes against Hindus in Bagerhat District during the Liberation War in 1971. The tribunal dropped charges against the third accused, Abdul Latif Talukder, since he had died at the Dhaka Medical College Hospital (DMCH) on July 28, 2015. The trio had been indicted on November 5, 2014, on eight charges. Siraj Kosai was indicted on four charges – for the killing of over 600 Hindus in Rampal; the killing of 50 Hindus in Ranjitpur; the abduction and killing of 19 persons at Besargati and Kandapara; and the killing of seven at Chulkathi. Two common charges were brought against three – for the killing of 47 Hindus; while one charge each was separately laid against Khan Akram and Latif for the forcible conversion of 200 Hindus at Shakharikathi and the killing of freedom fighter Fazlur Rahman Shikder on   December 13, 1971, respectively.

On July 16, 2015, ICT-2 had sentenced Forkan Malik (65), a member of the then anti-liberation party, Muslim League (ML), to death for crimes against humanity during the Liberation War. The tribunal found Forkan guilty in three of five charges framed against him. Of the three charges, Forkan was given the death sentence on two – the brutal rape and killing of Golapi Rani Saha, a teenage Hindu girl, at Subidkhali village of Patuakhali District on August 17, 1971; and the rape of Aleya Begum and killing of her father and two other civilians in Kakarbunia village on August 22, 1971. He was given life imprisonment for raping two Hindu women in Subidkhali village and forcing them to leave the village for India on August 20, 1971. However, he was acquitted of two charges for lack of evidence – for killing four people, including two local Awami League (AL) leaders in Mirzaganj upazila (sub-District) on August 12, 1971; and for forcing three Hindu siblings to accept Islam, who later left the country.

On June 9, 2015, ICT-1 had awarded the death sentence to Syed Muhamad Hasan Ali (65) aka “Razakar Daroga (Head of Razakar ‘police’ unit)”, an alleged commander of the Tarail Razakar unit in Kishoreganj District and a member of another then anti-liberation party, Nezam-e-Islami (NeI), for his crimes against humanity during the Liberation War. Hasan was found guilty on five of six charges brought against him. He was sentenced to death on two charges – for killing 12 Hindus and torching 10 houses at Shimulhati village on September 9, 1971; and for killing eight people and the abduction of another 10 in Borgaon village on September 27, 1971. He was sentenced to life terms until death on three charges – for killing a villager, Tofazzal, abduction of two others and burning two houses at Konabhawal village on August 23, 1971; for abduction and murder of Kamini Kumar Ghosh and Jibon Chakravarty and looting the Ghosh house at Araiura village on October 8, 1971; and for the killing of villager Rashid Ali Bepari and the torching of 100 houses at Sachail village on December 11, 1971. The tribunal relieved him of the charge of torching and looting seven houses at Sachail village on April 27, 1971.

Earlier, on May 20, 2015, ICT-2 awarded life imprisonment to Mahidur Rahman (84) and Ashraf Hossain Chutu (65), active members of ML who later turned into Razakar leaders, for their involvement in crimes against humanity during the Liberation War. The tribunal found Mahidur and Chutu guilty on two of the three charges leveled against them, awarding imprisonment until death for the abduction of 39 villagers from Chandshikari, Chamatola, Kabirajtola and Eradot Biswasertola under Shibganj upazila of Chapainawabganj District and killing 24 of them on October 6, 1971, and October 7, 1971. They were sentenced to a five-year prison term on the second charge of attacking and burning down houses after looting them in Kabirajtola and Eradot Biswasertola villages on October 13, 1971. The third charge of attacking the houses of Kalumuddin Mondol, Abdur Rashid, Gajal and Ilias Mondol of Sherpur Bhandar village and torturing them on November 2, 1971, was dropped as the duo had already been sentenced under the 1972 Collaborators Act on the same charge.  

Thus far, the two ICTs have indicted 27 leaders including 13 from Jamaat-e-Islami (JeI), six from ML, four from Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) and two each from NeI and Jatiya Party (JP). Verdicts against 22 of them have already been delivered – 16 were awarded the death penalty, while the remaining six received life sentences. Of the 16 who received the death sentence, JeI Assistant Secretary Abdul Quader Mollah (65), who had earned the sobriquet ‘Mirpurer Koshai (Butcher of Mirpur)’, was hanged on December 12, 2013, and JeI Senior Assistant Secretary General Mohammed Kamaruzzaman (63), was hanged on April 11, 2015. Eight cases are currently pending with the Appellate Division of the SC, including that of JeI Ameer (Chief) Motiur Rahman Nizami; JeI Nayeb-e-Ameer (Deputy Chief) Abdus Subhan; JeI Secretary General Ali Ahsan Mohammad Mojaheed; JeI Assistant Secretary General ATM Azharul Islam; JeI central executive committee member Mir Quasem Ali; Mobarak Hossain, former AL general secretary of Mogra union and a rukon (union member) of the JeI and Razakar commander; former State Minister of HM Ershad's Government Syed Mohammad Qaisar; and Forkan Malik, a member of the then-ML. The case of BNP standing committee member Salauddin Quader Chowdhury (66), which was also pending with the Appellate Division of the SC, was decided on July 29, 2015, when the SC upheld his death sentence. On October 1, 2013, ICT-1 had sentenced Salauddin to death after proving his involvement in nine of 23 charges beyond reasonable doubt. However, on October 29, 2013, Salahuddin again appealed to the SC against the verdict, seeking acquittal on all charges. Meanwhile, immediately after the July 29, 2015, SC verdict upholding his death penalty, Gonojagoron Mancha demanded the immediate execution of the verdict. Gonojagoron Mancha spokesperson Imran H. Sarkar argued, “The evil force and conspiracy against the country has been destroyed through the verdict."

The remaining five death penalties are in absentia, and include Abul Kalam Azad alias Bachchu Razakar, former Al-Badr leader and JeI member; Mohammad Ashrafuzzaman Khan alias Nayeb Ali and Chowdhury Mueenuddin, former Al-Badr leaders and JeI members; Zahid Hossain Khokon alias Khokon, vice-president of BNP's Nagarkanda unit and a Razakar commander of Faridpur District; and Syed Muhamad Hasan Ali, commander of the Tarail Razakar unit in Kishoreganj District and a member of NeI. Out of six persons who were awarded life sentences, two persons have already died serving their sentence – former JeI Ameer Ghulam Azam (91), who died on October 23, 2014; and former BNP minister Abdul Alim (83), who died on August 30, 2014. JeI Nayeb-e-Ameer Delwar Hossain Sayedee is lodged in Kashimpur Central jail of Gazipur District; Mahidur Rahman (84) and Ashraf Hossain Chutu (65), active members of the then-ML are lodged in Dhaka Central Jail; and former JP Member of Parliament (MP) Abdul Jabbar was sentenced in absentia.

Vowing to execute all war crimes trial verdicts, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina Wajed declared, on April 15, 2015, "Two war crimes trial verdicts (one against Abdul Quader Mollah and another against Mohammed Kamaruzzaman) have already been executed, Inshaallah, we'll execute the rest of the verdicts, no matter what barriers come. We'll move ahead and seek cooperation of all, including the media personalities, in this regard." Meanwhile, on July 16, 2015, Law Minister Anisul Huq announced, “The two International Crimes Tribunals will be merged into one after their judges’ return to the country from a conference in Argentina.” The six judges of the two tribunals are to attend a two-week international conference in Argentina to share their experience of holding war crimes’ trials and are expected to return towards the end of August. The AL-led Government formed ICT-1 on March 25, 2010, in line with the party's electoral pledge to try people who committed crimes against humanity during the Liberation War. Furthermore, the Government constituted ICT-2 on March 22, 2012, to expedite the trial process. Each tribunal consists of a Chairman and two other members.

The Islamists have been pushed back decisively in Bangladesh, but latent capacities remain, and a backlash is building up as greater and greater pressure is exerted on them by the state. The succession of brutal killings of bloggers constitute high visibility soft target attacks intended to destabilize the situation and draw recruits into new Islamist formations, even as the older groups lose leadership and cadres to the relentless judicial and enforcement processes initiated by the Sheikh Hasina regime. Enormous gains have been registered by this regime in Bangladesh, but vulnerabilities persist, particularly as the global environment unravels, and Islamist terrorism assumes new and fearsome forms across wide areas of the world.


NEWS BRIEFS

Weekly Fatalities: Major Conflicts in South Asia
August 3-9, 2015

 

Civilians

Security Force Personnel

Terrorists/Insurgents

Total

BANGLADESH

 

Islamist Terrorism

1
0
0
1

INDIA

 

Jammu and Kashmir

0
3
4
7

Manipur

0
1
0
1

Left-Wing Extremism

 

Maharashtra

1
0
0
1

Total (INDIA)

1
4
4
9

PAKISTAN

 

Balochistan

0
0
2
2

FATA

0
1
24
25

Punjab

0
1
3
4

Sindh

10
1
0
11

PAKISTAN (Total)

10
3
29
42
Provisional data compiled from English language media sources.


BANGLADESH

Secular blogger Niladri Chattopadhyay Niloy hacked to death in Dhaka city: On August 7, 2015, Niladri Chattopadhyay Niloy alias Niloy Neel (28), a secular blogger and a Gonojagoron Mancha (People's Resurgence Platform) activist was hacked to death at his Goran house in Khilgaon area of Dhaka city in broad daylight. Later in the evening, a group identifying itself as Ansar Al Islam, Bangladesh chapter of Al-Qaeda in the Indian Sub-continent (AQIS), claimed the responsibility for the murder in an email sent out to almost all media outlets. Daily Star, August 8, 2015.


INDIA

Terror claimed lives of over 200 defence personnel since 2012, says Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar: Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar, in a written reply in Lok Sabha (lower house of Parliament), said that over 200 defence personnel have been killed due to insurgency, terrorism and cross border firing in the country since 2012. Parrikar said that 61 were martyred in 2012, 54 in 2013, 56 in 2014 and in 2015, till August 3, 30 have been killed. Times of India, August 8, 2015.

FICNs worth INR 1364.3 million seized in three years, says Union Minister of State for Finance Jayant Sinha: Union Minister of State for Finance, Jayant Sinha on August 4 said in Rajya Sabha (Upper House of Parliament) that more than 2.73 million pieces of Fake Indian Currency Notes (FICNs), with face value of INR 1364.3 million, were seized in three years (2012-2014). Replying to a question in Rajya Sabha, Jayant Sinha said that in order to stay ahead of the counterfeiters, the government has recently introduced revised numbering pattern in all denominations. Business Standard, August 5, 2015.

Keralite youth in Islamic State (IS) fold, says Police: The Intelligence Wing of the Kerala Police has confirmed that a youth from the state has joined the Islamic State (IS). Officials who refused to share the whereabouts of the person said he had been working in the Middle East before joining the militant group a year ago. "The information is reasonably confirmed. He is reported to have lived in Syria and Iraq afterwards," the officials said. Though there are reports that two other Keralites too joined the group, the Police said they were yet to receive reliable information in this regard. New Indian Express, August 4, 2015.

26/11 Mumbai attack planned & launched from Pakistan, says retired Pakistani official: In deeply embarrassing disclosures for Pakistan, its chief investigator of the 26/11 Mumbai terror attacks has stated that the mayhem was planned and launched from this country and that the operation was directed from an ops room in Karachi (Pakistan). Tariq Khosa, a top police officer who was made Director General of the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) weeks after the 26/11 Mumbai terror attacks, has written a revealing article in Dawn newspaper giving graphic details of the plot and its investigation, thereby confirming what India has been saying for long. Economic Times, August 5, 2015.

ISI trying to push militants to attack India's hinterland, according to Intelligence inputs: Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) has intensified its attempts to push terrorists into India to carry out terror strike in hinterland, official sources said on August 6. Quoting intelligence inputs, they said, there have been intensified attempts of infiltration by militants from across the border in recent past. All these attempts were being made at the behest of ISI with the objective of carrying out terror attacks in the hinterland, sources added. Times of India, August 7, 2015.

Terror strike in Udhampur is part of persistent attempts by terrorists from Pakistan to vitiate peaceful atmosphere in J&K, says UHM Rajnath Singh:Union Home Minister (UHM) Rajnath Singh making a suo moto statement in both Houses of Parliament on August 6 said that the terror strike in Udhampur is a part of persistent attempts by terrorists from Pakistan to vitiate the peaceful atmosphere in Jammu and Kashmir (J&K). "The Government remains committed to combating terrorism with a strong resolve and ensuring the safety and security of our citizens and our security personnel," he said in the identical statements made in Rajya Sabha (Upper House) and Lok Sabha (Lower House). Daily Excelsior, August 7, 2015.

Maoists making inroads into urban areas of the State, admits Maharashtra CM Devendra Fadnavis: Chief Minister (CM) Devendra Fadnavis, who also holds the Home portfolio, told Maharashtra Legislative Council that the Communist Party of India-Maoist (CPI-Maoist) cadres are trying to create base in Mumbai-Nashik-Pune belt. "It has come to light that in the urban and industrial belts in these areas, the Maoists are trying to clandestinely propagate their ideology and are creating an impression that they are raising their voice on Dalit issues and attracting Dalit youth to the Maoist movement," admitted CM Fadnavis. DNA, August 5, 2015.

Wipe out extremist ideologies from State, GoI tells Assam Police: Union Ministry of Home Affairs (UMHA) has asked the Assam Police to launch a 'counter-radicalization' programme to eliminate fundamentalist extremist ideologies in the state. The directive came following a recent intelligence report that marked Assam as 'vulnerable' to radical extremism. An unnamed UMHA official stated, "The presence of Jammat-ul-Mujahedeen of Bangladesh (JMB) in the state has triggered a huge concern. Now, the report of Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) ideology spreading in the State is surely a matter of serious concern. The Police have been asked to alert all its forces to keep a sharp eye on any such activities." Times of India, August 8, 2015.


NEPAL

Nepal four major parties sign 6-province model deal in new constitution, says report: Nepal's four major parties have reached a landmark deal to divide the country into six provinces, each sharing its border with India, resolving contentious issues of federalism under the new constitution. Following a meeting, the Constitutional Political Dialogue and Consensus Committee (CPDCC) of the Constituent Assembly (CA) finally inked an agreement at midnight to carve out the six federal units. "A constitution with federalism and demarcation has been ensured," Prime Minister Sushil Koirala tweeted. "I call on everyone to not be stuck on minor disagreements and work to build and develop the country." The Hindu, August 10, 2015.


PAKISTAN

Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif approves Pur Aman Balochistan Plan: Prime Minister (PM) Nawaz Sharif on August 6 approved the Pur Aman Balochistan (Peaceful Balochistan) plan aimed at bringing the angry Baloch back to the national mainstream. He said that those who would lay down their arms would be given incentives. Nawaz asked the authorities concerned to reach out to the people of Balochistan and make them partners in the development process. The News, August 7, 2015.

Army chief enjoys support of Government, Army, and the entire nation, says Federal Minister for Interior Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan: Ruling out the possibility of any conspiracy against Chief of the Army Staff (CoAS) General Raheel Sharif, Federal Minister for Interior Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan on August 3 said that the COAS has the confidence of the Government, armed forces and the entire nation. He further said that the Pakistan Army was a disciplined and highly professional force and speaking against the army was harmful to the country and the military. The News, August 4, 2015.

Nexus between terrorists and drug-pushers to be broken, says CoAS General Raheel Sharif: The Chief of the Army Staff (CoAS), General Raheel Sharif on August 3 said that the nexus between drug- pushers and terrorists would be eliminated at all costs as drug peddlers and those involved in drugs production were as much pernicious to the national security as the terrorists. "Drug money is being used for abetting terrorism and, therefore, it is important that drug dealers are dealt with an iron hand," Sharif emphasised, adding, "We will break the nexus among drug dealers, financiers and perpetrators of terrorism. We will not allow these drug barons to negatively influence and spoil our future generations." The News, August 4, 2015.


SRI LANKA

Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe assures national security under a future UNP Government: Prime Minister (PM) and leader of the ruling United National Party (UNP), Ranil Wickremesinghe on August 6 assured the people of Sri Lanka not to fear over a resurgence of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) as the country would be safeguarded with an excellent defense minister under a future UNP Government. Wickremesinghe said that the defense minister under a future UNP government will be President Maithripala Sirisena, who is the commander-in-chief. Colombo Page, August 7, 2015.


The South Asia Intelligence Review (SAIR) is a weekly service that brings you regular data, assessments and news briefs on terrorism, insurgencies and sub-conventional warfare, on counter-terrorism responses and policies, as well as on related economic, political, and social issues, in the South Asian region.

SAIR is a project of the Institute for Conflict Management and the South Asia Terrorism Portal.

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