Soldiers in armoured vehicles patrolled Assam on Sunday, enforcing a curfew, with orders to shoot on sight after 55 people were killed.
GUWAHATI: Soldiers in armoured vehicles patrolled Assam on Sunday, enforcing a curfew, with orders to shoot on sight after 55 people died in attacks blamed on militants.
Police blamed the string of attacks, which started on Friday and targeted Hindi-speaking people, on militants of the outlawed United Liberation Front of Asom (ULFA), which is fighting for an independent homeland.
"Security forces have fanned out across the region with the army, police, and paramilitary troopers engaged in a systematic anti-insurgency offensive," district magistrate Absar Hazarika said.
The rebels went on a two-day rampage, killing 48 people and wounding 30 in raids in the eastern districts of Tinsukia, Dibrugarh, and Dhemaji targeting migrant workers.
Five policemen and two officials were killed by a landmine as they returned from conducting local polls in Karbi Anglong district, some 260 kilometres from Guwahati, police said.
The curfew was clamped across the state late on Saturday, and may be reviewed by security officials later on Sunday.
Troops have authority to shoot anyone defying the embargo.
Authorities in eastern Assam formed peace committees involving community leaders to instill confidence among Hindi-speaking minorities.
Most victims were from Bihar and had made Assam their home for decades, doing odd jobs in brick kilns, fishing and construction.
ULFA is one of several separatist groups operating in Assam, a state known for its oil reserves and tea crops but where at least 20,000 people have died in rebel violence since 1979.
In 2000, ULFA militants killed at least 100 Hindi-speaking people in Assam in a series of well-planned attacks after promising to free the state of all 'non-Assamese migrant workers', who they claim take away their jobs.
The ULFA has not claimed responsibility for the latest attacks.
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