This Article is From Jul 24, 2015

2 Nagaland Children Allegedly Killed in Crossfire Between Security Forces, Militants

2 Nagaland Children Allegedly Killed in Crossfire Between Security Forces, Militants

Representaitonal image.

On July 16, Aso, 13, and Tiizali, 14, both students of class 7 at the GHS Pholary in Nagaland were shot dead. Esther Jarror, a 24-year-old mother of two, was injured.

The two children were allegedly killed in crossfire between security forces from the Indian Army's para commandos and Assam Rifles and militants of the National Socialist Council of Nagaland (Khaplang).

The Army says the soldiers were returning after a counter-insurgency operation in which two militants of the Myanmar-based NSCN(K) were killed, when they were fired upon. The convoy was carrying the bodies of the militants killed.

A fact-finding team of the Naga Students' Federation and the Naga Peoples Movement for Human Rights quotes witnesses who say villagers had gathered at Phor to request the returning convoy to hand back the body of one of the militants for a traditional Naga funeral.

The report alleges that Major Surinder Singh of the Assam Rifles (AR) refused to hand over the body, but agreed to the request that the bodies be carried in coffins. Moments later, it alleges, the soldiers opened unprovoked fire.

In 20 minutes of firing, the report alleges, Aso, was hit by a bullet which struck "right below her armpit and came out on the other side of her body".

The report says Tiizali was out on the road with friends "when the shooting started. His friends escaped but he was shot in the chest and the skull."

The Assam Rifles, in its report to the Home Ministry, has a very different version. It says the villagers had blocked the road and the army convey was fired upon.

Lieutenant Colonel Ankush Marken of the Assam Rifles has also accused the state administration and Nagaland police of "selectively issuing and withholding very sensitive information complicating the matter" and of "tampering" with crucial "evidence."

The officer's report said, "veracity of the statements of villagers is doubtful....villagers had prior information about the militants... (but) no information was sent to the security forces."
 
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