Bhutan not to allow anti-India rebels on its soil

GUWAHATI - Bhutans Prime Minister Jigme Y. Thinley Friday said Indian separatists would not be allowed to set up bases and launch hit-and-run guerrilla attacks out of the Himalayan nation.

Now there are no militants from Assam in our country and let me assure that we shall not allow any anti-India forces to use our soil to carry out violent activities, the prime minister told journalists here.

Thinley was in Guwahati en route to Bhutan as some of the Bhutanese districts need to be traversed through Assam.

From our side we shall take all security measures to ensure that no one is able to enter Bhutan for subversive activities, Thinley said.

Refuting the possibility that militants from northeast India could again set up base in his country, Thinley said: Such speculations are incorrect and there are no militant activities in Bhutan especially after our security forces flushed out militant groups from our country.

Our security establishment is on alert and every measure is being taken to ensure that whatever has happened in the past does happen again, he added.

In 2003, Bhutan launched Operation All Clear and busted at least 30 camps belonging to outlawed rebel groups United Liberation Front of Asom (ULFA), the National Democratic Front of Bodoland (NDFB) and the Kamatapur Liberation Organisation (KLO).

More than 20 rebels were killed in the operation that helped the country flush out all Indian rebels from its soil.

India and Bhutan share a 643-km unfenced border.

Bhutan became the worlds newest democracy in 2008 after the first general elections gave Thinleys Druk Phuensum Tshogpa party an absolute majority, thereby transforming the largely Buddhist nation from a 100-year-old monarchy to parliamentary democracy.