Muivah arriving today for talks with centre
New Delhi, February 26: Carrying forward the dialogue process on the vexed Naga issue, NSCN-IM General Secretary Thuingaleng Muivah will arrive here Saturday to hold talks with the Centre’s new pointsman and are likely to meet Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.
Muivah and Chairman Isak Chisi Swu had last visited India in December 2006 and held talks with Government leaders.
Muivah is coming a fortnight after the Government appointed R S Pandey, a former Petroleum Secretary, as the new interlocutor on Naga talks earlier this month.
The top Naga rebel leader based in the Dutch capital Amsterdam is likely to call on the Prime Minister and Home Minister P Chidambaram, official sources said here today.
Ahead of meetings with political leadership, the Naga leaders will hold talks with Pandey on March 2 & 3, they said.
The NSCN leader is also expected to visit Nagaland besides addressing to the issue of clashes between the cadres of NSCN-IM and its rival NSCN (Khaplang), which resulted in unrest in the recent past.
Sources in the Government said they would try and iron out the differences with the Centre on key issues, including the sovereignty demand under which the NSCN-IM has proposed a federal relationship with Indian Union.
Pandey was appointed as the new interlocutor for Naga talks on February 12 and while appointing him, Chidambaram had said, “I am happy to announce the appointment of R S Pandey as the interlocutor and the representative of the Government of India to hold talks with NSCN-IM.”
A Nagaland cadre IAS officer of 1972 batch, Pandey has served as chief secretary in the insurgency-hit state and is a recipient of Prime Minister’s Award for Excellence in Public Service in 2007 besides the UN Public Service Award in 2008.
He was appointed in place of former home secretary K Padmanabhaiah, who had handled the dialogue process with the NSCN-IM for nearly a decade. The Government relieved him from the responsibility last September.
The Naga delegation is now expected to continue its discussion with Pandey over the limits of flexibility within the Constitution and whether a “sub-national constitution” could be accommodated within it.
The NSCN leader may also review progress made since the NSCN-IM submitted a 20-point charter of demands to the Centre. In this charter, the NSCN-IM has sought unification of all Naga-inhabited areas of the north-east–an issue opposed by Manipur, Assam and Arunachal Pradesh–separate representation at the UN and greater rights over natural resources, finance, defence and policing.
A ceasefire was agreed upon with NSCN-IM since August 1997. In May 1998, the first negotiator Swaraj Kaushal was appointed. He continued in his post till July 1999. (PTI)