IMPHAL (The Thursday Times) — Three Kuki-Zo men were killed on Saturday in a gunfight with unidentified armed men at Kekru Naga village in the Nungba sub-division of Manipur’s Noney district, police said, hours after Meitei and Naga groups marched together in Imphal.
The firing reportedly began around 10am and went on for several hours, after two days of intermittent attacks on Kekru Naga and nearby villages. Police tightened security in the area but did not say what caused the shootout or who was involved.
The Kuki Inpi Manipur, the apex body of Kuki tribes, said the dead were village volunteers and blamed the Naga armed group NSCN-IM and the Zeliangrong United Front (Kamson) for the killings. It accused the authorities of failing to protect Kuki-Zo communities and demanded justice and immediate intervention to stop further violence.
The killings came on the day thousands of Meitei and Naga protesters rallied in Imphal, demanding the scrapping of the Suspension of Operations pact with Kuki armed groups and the withdrawal of the Assam Rifles. A Naga-Kuki conflict that began in February in Ukhrul district has killed more than 50 people, on top of the Meitei-Kuki violence that has gripped Manipur since May 2023.
