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Three Indian Nationals Killed in Myanmar Civil War

The three men were captured by the rebel People’s Defense Army but subsequently tortured and killed by a rival outfit.

The border between Myanmar and India in the small village of Rikhawdar, Chin State, Myanmar, Mar. 24, 2017.

Three Indian nationals have been killed in Myanmar in an unusual sequence of events that has left resistance groups groping for answers.

The three Indian nationals were arrested at Tedim in Myanmar’s Chin State on March 17 after they were found wandering in a suspicious manner by members of the People’s Defense Army (PDA), which is one of the several pro-democracy resistance groups active in the region.

Tedim is located about 80 kilometers east of the border town of Zokhawthar in the Indian state of Mizoram and is inhabited by the Zomi community.

A senior PDA functionary told The Diplomat that the trio was taken to a safehouse and quizzed for several hours. All the documents in their possession, including three Indian voter identity cards and only one inner line permit, which every Indian national must obtain for visiting Mizoram, were seized from them.

The voter identity cards revealed the names of Aftar Hussain Mazumder, Jahangir Mirza, and Arfik Rahaman Khan. While Mazumder and Mirza hail from Cachar in the northeastern Indian state of Assam, Khan’s residence is at Paschim (West) Medinipur in West Bengal. The trio traveled in a white SUV with a West Bengal registration number from the border town of Zokhawthar in Mizoram to Tedim. The PDA has seized the vehicle as well.

The vehicle in which the three Indian men reportedly traveled from Mizoram in India to Tedim in Myanmar’s Chin State.(Photo credit: Special Arrangement)

“They could speak neither Mizo nor English. They did not have any knowledge of the terrain and the disturbed conditions in the region,” said the PDA functionary, who did not want to be named, adding that “nobody, and not even journalists, ventures into the region without the knowledge of the resistance groups.

But we understood that they were Bengalis, and so we began searching for a translator. On the next day, we managed to bring one translator from Mizoram and began a fresh round of interrogation,” claimed the functionary.

The Indian nationals disclosed that they had traveled to Tedim to explore the possibility of selling pillows and mattresses. “We remained confused but decided to seize the vehicle and release them at the border on the next day. But tragedy struck on the early morning of the next day,” the functionary explained.

On March 20, the arrested nationals were relocated from the safehouse to a PDA camp at a remote location in the hills between Tonzang and Tedim. Around 5 a.m. on March 22, a group of about 30 functionaries belonging to another rebel outfit aligned with the Myanmar military that also operates out of the Indian state of Manipur attacked the camp,........

© The Diplomat