Aizawl, Sep 8 (PTI) With their heads tonsured and cigarette burns on bodies, two teenage boys returned home in Mizoram after being held captive by militants in adjoining Myanmar’s Chin state for nearly a week, an Assam Rifles officer said on Sunday.
The two boys, aged 16 and 15, were allegedly abducted by the Hualngoram unit of Chin Defence Force (CDF), one of several militant organisations fighting the military junta in Myanmar, on September 1 from Rih Dil Lake, a tourist spot in the neighbouring country near the Indian border, the officer said.
“A group of five boys from Zokhawthar village in Mizoram had gone to Rih Dil Lake on motorcycles on September 1. On reaching there, they were stopped by cadres of CDF, who thrashed them because of a previous scuffle they had with some other boys from Zokhawthar,” she said.
Three of the five boys managed to escape and return to India while the two were held hostage by the CDF, the Assam Rifles officer said.
“The two boys were kept in Rih Dil area for two days and then transferred to Liando camp in Seik village of Myanmar on September 3, where they were kept in a prison and tortured,” the officer said.
“Their heads were tonsured, cigarette burns were inflicted on their heads and bodies and the front teeth of one of the boys were also extracted,” she said.
They were released by the CDF on the evening of September 6, she said.
The militants may have abducted and tortured the two boys as a show of authority or dominance in the border area and also to extend its say in affairs of border areas by dominating village council leaders and other local leaders in the area, the officer said.
She claimed that the CDF collects taxes on all goods, to and from India, under the protection of the Chin National Army (CNA), a Chin state-based armed group.
Earlier, the incident had sparked tension in Zokhawthar as locals demanded the immediate release of the two boys, according to village council president Lalmuanpuia.
The local people had also reminded the militants how the Mizos had welcomed and sheltered Chin people fleeing violence in Myanmar. PTI CORR ACD
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