Bangla bid to end insurgency, refugee migration to India
The Bangladesh government - with the backing of the army - is
seriously pursuing talks to end a lingering insurgency that has
driven tens of thousands of tribals into refugee camps in neighbouring
India.
Political observers in Dhaka say the latest round of talks between
the Awami League government and the rebel leaders from the Chittagong
Hill Tracts in the southeast of the country has taken the negotiations,
which started in 1985, a little closer to its goal of restoring
peace in the region.
Guerrillas of the Jana Shanghati Samity have been fighting for
greater autonomy for ethnic minorities in the border region for
21 years. The talks last week were the first time rebel leaders
had come to Dhaka and stayed at the state guest house, Meghna,
generally reserved for international VIPs.
Shontu Larma, who is the leader of the JSS and its armed wing,
called the Shanti Bahini, had earlier said to the press at the
hill town of Khagrachari in the CHT where the earlier rounds of
talks were held, that the ruling Awami League was more serious
than previous governments about reaching a solution.
Last December, four months after it had swept to power in elections
in Bangladesh, the government met with the rebels for the first
time.
Soon after, on December 27, the army chief, General Mahbubur Rahman,
said in Rangmati, the main town in the CHT area that the army
was suffering from battle fatigue and would like to return to
the barracks, a signal that the government and army were equally
keen on negotiating a peace deal with the rebels.
A third of the Bangladesh army is deployed in the area to counter
the insurgency, costing the government about $90 million a year.
This apart, Dhaka has been regularly hauled up for human rights
abuse in the area.
''There are about 50,000 refugees in various Indian states and
they first went there in 1960 when the Kaptai Dam was built,''
says Dr Abrar Chowdhury of the refugee rehabilitation unit, a
think-tank affiliated with the Dhaka university.
''Conditions in the camps are reportedly appalling but India has
prevented any visits by international bodies including the UNHCR,''
Dr Chowdhury adds. He pointed out that the humanitarian issues
have been side-stepped again and again because of political and
security issues. And by both sides.
The ethnic minorities of the CHT - about 11 tribal communities
- now call themselves the Jumma people. The majority belong to
the Chakma tribe, and are ethnically separate from the majority
Bengalees who have always dominated the government.
The insurgency is led by Shontu Larma, whose brother Manobendro
founded the JSS and SB in 1974, three years after Bangladesh broke
away from Pakistan. Within two years, the JSS had turned its guns
on the security forces because the then government refused to
accept its people as ethnic minorities.
Relationship soured further as the timber trade proliferated and
the hill people were increasingly marginalised in their own land.
The Kaptai Dam, a hydroelectric project built in 1960, had eaten
up all cultivable land and whatever was left began to be taken
over by the majority Bengalee settlers from the plains.
Although martial law was never declared in the hill area and civil
law prevails in theory, the administration has been virtually
under the control of the army, inviting widespread criticism for
human rights violations.
The army has eased its stranglehold only in the last couple of
years, and for four years a cease-fire has also been in operation.
That has allowed both sides to bring down casualties, but no reliable
figures are available.
Talks began in October 1985 during the martial law regime of ousted
President General Hussain Mohammed Ershad. The previous Bangladesh
National Party government included civilians in the peace talks
for the first time in 1992. Then prime minister Khaleda Zia negotiated
a ''trial'' return of refugees with Indian officials, but the
exercise was not a success.
Those who returned did not always get what they were promised
and the trickle stopped. In addition, the BNP administration was
not able to win the confidence of the refugees, many of whom had
been forced to leave the country because of a ''settlers strategy''
adopted by the first BNP government.
Failing to crush the insurgency with military might, the BNP encouraged
the resettling in tribal lands of landless Bengalee settlers,
a policy that has changed the hill region's demographic profile.
Now almost half the one million population are ''settlers'', who
have also taken to arms to fight to keep what they were given
by the government.
However, it seems likely that their rights may no longer be protected
should a peace deal be signed between the government and insurgents.
''The JSS will not accept their right to residence in the CHT.
They are the people who will have to pay for the peace,'' said
Maksud Ahmed, a critic of the rebels.
Political observers say this could prove tragic. As Ahmed warns:
''They (settlers) will become internally displaced people and
as much a humanitarian issue as the refugees are now.''
UNI
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