12 August 2015

The spoils of peace

Aug 8th 2015

IT IS understandable that India’s prime minister should celebrate a “historic” accord to end a bloody ethnic insurgency in the remote north-east of the country, announced on August 3rd. “The Naga political issue had lingered for six decades, taking a huge toll on generations of our people”, said Narendra Modi, as his government signed an agreement with the main Naga insurgent group, the National Socialist Council of Nagaland (NSCN).

In practice much has yet to be worked out. Decades of rumbling violence by secessionists; murderous clashes between rival Naga tribal groups; extortion by former rebel fighters; and repressive laws, especially the Armed Forces Special Powers Act: all have fostered instability and discouraged investment. Today Nagaland is much poorer than most of India. For young Nagas and other north-easterners, the surest route to success is to leave.

Most of the serious fighting in Nagaland, a state of about 2m people, ended in 1997, when guitar-strumming rebels agreed to a ceasefire and quit guerrilla life in the forest for comforts in town, where many are lauded like rock stars. Talks over a final agreement dragged on because insurgency leaders stuck to demands for either full sovereignty or, failing that, an expanded Nagaland to include fellow Nagas in neighbouring states, notably Manipur.

Since the details of the new accord are not yet public, the capital of Nagaland, Kohima, has seen neither protests nor celebrations. But redrawing state borders is out of the question. Manipur’s government, for one, has previously made clear its refusal to cede any meaningful authority over its territory to autonomous Naga councils. To clinch a deal the ageing and frail NSCN leaders, many in their 80s, have presumably softened long-held demands and been rewarded with promises of political positions inside Nagaland itself, along with plenty of central-government cash.

Whether the rumbling conflict is really over now depends on reactions from smaller insurgent outfits, especially a breakaway Naga faction, the NSCN-Khaplang. It draws much of its support from Nagas living across the border in Myanmar and has good relations with the government there. India’s intelligence agencies previously backed it, to weaken the main insurgency, but in March it broke the ceasefire and in June ambushed an army convoy near the Myanmar border, killing 18 soldiers. That attack, the worst on the army anywhere since the Kargil war against Pakistan in Kashmir in 1999, was a gruesome message that Khaplang’s leaders expect their share of the spoils from peace.

A previous deal with the Nagas, the Shillong Accord of 1975, failed after breakaway factions took to the hills. Now there are better hopes for a wide-ranging peace. Ajai Shukla, a writer on defence, calls the main NSCN a “mother group” that has trained, advised and influenced other insurgent outfits across the north-east. Its fighters seem unwilling to give up urban life with all its fripperies such as smartphones for the hardships of the forest.

More negotiations between states and insurgent groups are presumably under way, or soon will be. Their responses will determine whether a historic change has really been achieved. Also needed is an end to often bloody rivalries among over 20 Naga tribal groups within Nagaland and several more in Manipur. The Baptist church, active in the north-east, has been leading a tribal reconciliation process.

Since coming to office last year Mr Modi has spent an unusual amount of time on north-eastern affairs. This week he lauded “Naga courage” and tribal “sensitivity to Mother Nature”. With peace, his aim is to spread economic development by building roads, railways and airports. Then he wants to encourage trade, mainly via Myanmar, with South-East Asia, part of his “Look East, Act East” policy of expanding Indian influence in the region. And, not least, he hopes to raise the brand of his ruling Bharatiya Janata Party in states where it has previously been irrelevant—with luck helping to entrench a Modi raj.

Read more at http://www.economist.com/news/asia/21660574-countrys-longest-running-ethnic-insurgency-over-spoils-peace#Llqb0IvxvFZkPd5C.99

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