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From MIZZIMA News Group (r)



The following is a news piece covered in the Imphal Free Press, Manipur
State of India on 13th March. The news appear at the time when the
relationship between the governments of Burma and India seems to be
improving. Menda village (in the report) means Mintha-Watshu village in
Burma. According to sources from Manipur Cultural Integration Conference
in Imphal, the Burmese troops had uprooted the Border Pillar Nos. 66 to 71
from their original places to inside the territory of Manipur. And Burmese
government had reportedly built 3 mile-long road on the "occupied"
territory as a part of Tamu-Kalay road (the one being built with the
assistance of the government of India). But the central government in New
Delhi continues to neglect this.

MIZZIMA


Myanmar continues encroachment on state territory

By Salam Rajesh
>From The Free Press newspaper, Imphal, Manipur
14th March 1999

In what could be described as a continuing intrusion into Indian territory
and the illegal occupation of land belonging to Manipur, Myanmarese
military personnel had reportedly encroached upon more than half a
kilometre of Manipur's territory in the border area of Yangoupokpi village
in Chandel district.

According to the villagers of Yangoupokpi, a small hamlet situated on the
edge of the Manipur-Myanmar international border roughly 30kms north of
Moreh town, Myanmarese military personnel had uprooted the Border Pillar
No.87 and had transplanted it into Manipur's territory more than half a
kilometre from its original site.

A villager of Dondingphai village, another (Maring) name for Yangoupokpi,
said they were witnessed to the act of the Myanmarese soldiers who shifted
the B.P.87 from its original site to its present location approximately
ten years back.

The B.P.87, erected in 1969-70 after official demarcation of Indo-Burma
international boundary, was originally located on the slope of a hillock
overlooking the Wasiphai plain and the Menda (Mongshu in Meiteilon)
village on the Myanmar said, the villagers said. The said border pillar is
now located right at the eastern edge of Yangoupokpi village.

Incidentally, the more than half a kilometre of Manipur's land, stretching
from the Wasiphai plain upto Yangoupokpi, which is now 'illegally
occupied' by Myanmar covers a rich forest belt of Khangra (Dipterocarpus
tuberculatus) and Teak (Chingshu, Tectona grandis) trees.

"Sometimes we simply feel like destroying this (border) pillar which had
deprived us of much of our precious land and forest resources", a
disheartened villager told this scribe.

Yangoupokpi village is located 8 kms east of Saibol Maring village and is
reached via Sita village in Chandel's Tegnoupal subdivision. The current
health minister, Morung Makunga is the circle MLA.

It may be mentioned here that the village of Yangoupokpi suffered
extensively during the recent ethnic clashes and the village was deserted
for more than three years. Maring, Meitei and Nepali settlers had since
strove to rebuild their homes and to re-establish Yangoupokpi's commercial
hub by trade and commerce with Myanmar's neighbouring villages.

Meanwhile, it may be recalled here that reports of illegal occupation of
Manipur's territory by neighbouring Myanmar had been in the news through
the years, the most striking report was that of alleged intrusion in the
Molcham village area in Manipur's Chandel district.

A team of the Manipur Cultural Integration Conference led by 'the grand
old man of Manipur' Maharajah Kumar Priyabrata, who visited Molcham some
years back, had reported that the B.P.66, erected in1969, 70 at Molcham,
had been destroyed by Myanmarese soldiers and that a new one had been
erected in its place deep inside Manipur's territory.

Myanmar's continued ingression and occupation of portions of Manipur's
territory through 'unethical' means would go unchecked if the state
government and the home ministry fails to pay proper attention to what is
happening at the international boundary, several observers said.

MIZZIMA News Group
1944, Outram Line, Kingsway Camp-9
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