Victims Thangkhokai Haokip (31), Jamkhogin Haokip (35) and Hollenson Baite (20) were stabbed and had their limbs broken before being shot at close range<\/a>, sources said.<\/p>\n
In Thoubal district, unidentified gunmen shot three young men from the minority community in their legs and left them at the Yairipok-Charangpat Road junction around 2pm, police said.<\/p>\n
The Ukhrul trio, assigned to guard their village Thowai, had been asleep in their bunkers when a small group of heavily armed assailants stealthily entered the hamlet around 5am. The manner of the intrusion and the attack that followed suggested the assailants were trained insurgents.<\/p>\n
“This attack on an interior village well inside Naga-dominated territory (part of police district Ukhrul and revenue district Kamjong) could only be carried out by insurgents who possibly came in from across the India-Myanmar border,” a source in the security establishment said.<\/p>\n
The nearest security post is at Mongneljang, 8km from the Kuki settlement within a cluster of villages inhabited by the Tangkhul Naga community. The attack on Kukis in a Naga area might have been planned to create mistrust between the two tribal communities, sources said.<\/p>\n
“This is a pre-planned attack, and a cowardly one. We request security forces to do more to protect tribals, who carry single-shot guns while guarding their homes from attackers carrying sophisticated weapons and mortars stolen from police stations and armouries,” the Indigenous Tribal Leaders’ Forum said.<\/p>\n
Deploy Army to recover looted arms: Tribal outfit<\/span>
If violence<\/a> is to be stopped, the Army and other central security forces should start operations to retrieve looted government-issued weapons. The state police force is fully compromised,” the Indigenous Tribal Leaders’ Forum said.
The attack took place a day after Manipur’s plan to rehabilitate people displaced by ethnic violence in prefabricated houses away from their native districts ran into resistance in Tangkhul Naga-inhabited Ukhrul, with both the host community and their prospective Kuki guests said to have “mutually” decided that “this isn’t needed”.<\/p>\n
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