“This cannot be tolerated by anyone at any cost and simply putting the blame on intelligence failure is the lamest excuse. The rogue Assam Rifles personnel responsible for this heinous crime have to be brought to justice,” said Temjen Imna Along.
TFM Desk
BJP Nagaland state unit president Temjen Imna Along, while condemning the Oting massacre of unarmed civilians, said that there can never be any justification of such a massacre targeting innocent civilians.
Stating that the innocent victims were labourers returning from a hard day’s work and were not armed with any firearms whatsoever, Temjen in a statement asserted that It is tantamount to “war crimes during peacetime and amount summary execution as well as genocide”.
Condemning the incident in the “highest term”, Temjen said that he was “deeply anguished and heartbroken” by the killing of 13 innocent Oting villagers Saturday evening by the Assam Rifles at Tiru area, Mon district.
“This cannot be tolerated by anyone at any cost and simply putting the blame on intelligence failure is the lamest excuse. The rogue Assam Rifles personnel responsible for this heinous crime have to be brought to justice and made to answer truthfully as to how innocent, unarmed persons were gunned down; why the AR could not discern that the 6 persons in the pick up truck were unarmed, innocent civilians; on what basis the commanding officer gave the firing order, etc.”
Temjen, who is a minister of the Nagaland government maintained that the incident is a very big discouragement to the Nagas as a whole, especially at a time when one of Konyak Naga sons from Tizit area itself was martyred in an ambush in Manipur not even a month back.
“Why do you kill our sons when our sons are also the ones making supreme sacrifices for the country?”
He further appealed to the Government of India and the state government to provide immediate ex-gratia to the next of kin of the victims followed by additional compensatory measures.
Stating that the Government of India and the Naga political groups are engaged in a peace process and at the threshold of settlement to the protracted Naga political issue, he said that it is a time to exercise extreme caution and patience in order to maintain hard earned peace after decades of violent, armed struggle.
“The Naga people stand united as a whole, with our Konyak brothers and sisters. We mourn with you. We feel the pain and anguish equally. We extend our heartfelt condolences to the members of the bereaved families. We wish the injured person(s) a speedy recovery. May the departed souls rest in eternal peace,” he said.