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The Communist Party of India (Marxist-Leninist) People's War emissaries -- writer Varavara Rao and balladeer Gadar -- on Saturday announced their withdrawal from the peace talks with the Andhra Pradesh government.
Rao told rediff.com that this was in protest against the encounter killings of seven PW members in recent days and an all-out offensive launched by the police against the Naxalites.
He said the recent spate of encounters, particularly in Khammam, Karimnagar and Warangal, were part of the offensive launched by the government.
"There is also a conspiracy being organised by high-level police officers for mobilising the surrendered Naxalites to kill both of us -- me and Gadar -- and also the activists in the mass organisation who, they think, are helping us. They also want to eliminate [Naxalite leader] S Appa Rao who, they think, may come for next round of talks on July 20."
"In these circumstances, we withdraw from representing the CPI-ML People's War in talks with the government. In fact, our duty was over on June 20 itself as the first phase of the dialogue for deciding the modalities for the full-fledged talks was over on that day," the writer pointed out.
"Since a section of the media is mentioning us as emissaries of CPI-ML People's War, we want to make it clear that we no longer represent the PW in the talks. It is a basic principle in jurisprudence that the client must be in a position to instruct his/her counsel. Now, because of the intense combing operations and encounter killings and false propaganda campaign, we think that the PW cannot instruct us. This is one of the reasons for our withdrawal."
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