Imphal, Mar 22 (PTI) Manipur Chief Minister Y Khemchand Singh held a meeting with a delegation of Kuki Zo Council in Guwahati, officials said on Sunday.
“Manipur CM held a closed door meeting with KZC delegation in Guwahati on Saturday evening”, an official said.
Officials, however, did not divulge any details of the meeting.
The Manipur government on Friday had invited the members of the Kuki Zo Council for a meeting to discuss steps to restore peace and normalcy in the ethnic strife-hit state.
In a letter addressed to the chairman of the Kuki Zo Council, the secretary to the chief minister conveyed Singh’s request for a meeting with council members on Saturday in Guwahati to deliberate on issues related to restoring normalcy in the state.
Meanwhile, Kuki Zo Council, in a statement issued on Sunday, said, “Yesterday, for the first time, the Government of Manipur, led by Chief Minister Yumnam Khemchand Singh, held a meeting with leaders of the Kuki-Zo Council (KZC) in Guwahati, Assam.
It said the meeting commenced at 7 pm and lasted approximately 1 hour and 45 minutes.
“As the first engagement after nearly three years of conflict between the Meitei and the Kuki-Zo communities, the interaction was largely an ice-breaking session”, it said.
“The KZC delegation raised several key issues, all of which were attentively heard by the chief minister. Prominent among these were the urgent need to de-escalate the ongoing tensions between the Kuki and Tangkhul communities, and the imperative of ensuring justice for the victims of the conflict as a fundamental prerequisite for any meaningful peace and reconciliation process,” it said.
KZC also emphasised the importance of maintaining the sanctity of the buffer zone until a political settlement is reached and stressed the need to expedite a resolution to the ongoing Suspension of Operations (SoO) talks to ensure durable and lasting peace in the region, it said.
“The chief minister, in turn, shared his concerns, commitments, and the steps undertaken by his government to restore peace and normalcy in Manipur. The CM expressed high appreciation for the KZC’s initiative and its bold step in engaging with him during this challenging period,” it said.
The meeting, however, concluded without any decisions or agreements, the statement added.
More than 260 people have been killed and thousands rendered homeless in ethnic violence in the state since May 2023. PTI COR RG
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