People pay respect to 8 of Meita community killed by Kuki militants in Jiribam

Imphal/Guwahati/New Delhi:

The bodies of six members of the same family and two senior citizens of the Meitei community who were killed in a terror attack by Kuki militants were brought home in Manipur’s Jiribam from a hospital in neighboring Assam’s Silchar today.

Autopsies have been done, but the family has yet to receive the reports. Residents of Jiribam who were at the Silchar hospital told NDTV that the state government may not want the reports to be shared immediately as the situation is tense and could trigger another round of public unrest as it happened a few days ago days, when the houses of deputies deputies happened. vandalized by the wicked.

The six from the same family were taken hostage by Kuki militants on November 11, the same day 10 militants who attacked civilian homes were shot dead by the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) in an encounter at Jiribam, 220 km of the state capital Imphal. .

The hostages were killed in captivity by Kuki militants and their bodies were dumped in a river. The six hostages were a woman, her baby, her two-year-old son, her mother, her sister and her sister’s daughter.

The Manipur government called the attackers “Kuki terrorists” in a cabinet resolution that also sought to designate them as an illegal organization or terrorist group.

The police and CRPF called the attackers militants who came with assault rifles and a rocket-propelled grenade (RPG) launcher, while civil society groups from the Kuki tribes called them “village volunteers”.

Laisharam Herojit, father of the infant and the boy, on November 13 appealed to the authorities to find his family as soon as possible and also appealed to the militants to release them safely.

“They are all innocent. My two children cannot even speak yet. The eldest has started to speak. Please release them unharmed and hand them over to their family,” he said.

Two days after the call, the bodies of his two-year-old son, his wife’s sister and her eight-year-old daughter were found floating in a river. Over the next two days, the partially decomposed bodies of his wife, eight-year-old baby and mother-in-law were found in the river.

“It is true,” he had told NDTV after all six bodies reached the mortuary.

The other two elders from the Meitei community were killed by Kuki militants during the attack at Borobekra village in Jiribam, just before a CRPF armored vehicle engaged the militants in a 45-minute encounter on November 11, they said police sources.

Political leaders across party lines condemned the killing of the three women and three children in Manipur. They said it was a terrorist attack as it was not a clash between two communities in a riot-like situation but a calculated hostage-taking operation with the intention of executing civilians.

“The absurdity of Kuki militants being called ‘village volunteers’ is such that such a thing is impossible in the context of Jammu and Kashmir, where if the police or government officially issues a statement specifying ‘militants’, civilians are not disrespected forces by parroting militants’ narratives,” a retired Indian Police Service (IPS) officer told NDTV on Imphal’s call, requesting anonymity.

Kuki groups say the November 11 Borobekra attack was in retaliation for an attack by suspected Meitei militants on Zairawn Hmar village in Jiribam on November 7, when a school teacher and mother of three from the Hmar tribe was allegedly raped, killed and set up. on fire.

The autopsy report said the teacher’s body was 99% burnt. Horrific injuries were seen, including broken bones and a severed skull. No samples could be taken to check for sexual assault because “body parts were completely charred and unrecognizable,” according to the report. The allegation of rape was made by her husband in a First Information Report (FIR).

The latest cycle of violence, however, began on October 19 when “Kuki miscreants” set fire to several houses and attacked the Borobekra police station, a November 16 state cabinet statement said.

It read as follows: On October 26, “Kuki miscreants” again set fire to a house in Moulkangthol village of the same district. On November 3, Jiribam police rescued a Vaiphei woman from Chandrapur Rani Veng Babupara and handed her over to her family. On November 7, a Hmar woman was killed and several houses were set on fire in Zairawn village by Meitei miscreants. On the same day, Kuki miscreants bombed Mongbung Meitei village. On 11 November, the CRPF effectively countered an armed offensive by Kuki militants on the Borobekara police station, which was hosting a relief camp, killing 11 militants. In the attack, two Meitei civilians were killed by the Kuki militants.

The National Investigation Agency (ANI) examines these cases.