M A I N   N E W S

ULFA strike again, kills 15 
* Central team visits areas
* People take to roads

Guwahati, January 7
ULFA militants today killed 15 Hindi-speaking people and injured 10 others in four separate attacks in Assam hours after Union Minister of State for Home Sriprakash Jaiswal visited the state in the wake of stepped up violence by the banned group since Friday.

Police in Sibsagar said seven Biharis died and three were injured when ULFA militants called them out of their homes at Borali Bari near Mahmara and opened fire at 9 pm.

In Dibrugarh district, six Hindi-speaking persons were gunned down and one injured in an attack by militants at Chokolia near Dimow, the police said.

Three motorcycle-borne militants fired indiscriminately with sophisticated weapons at workers at a brick kiln at Sepon Chagolia in Moran area of the same district at 8.30 pm.

A worker died on the spot while six others were injured.

One of the wounded later succumbed to his injuries, police said.

In Kokrajhar district in lower Assam, ULFA militants shot and injured a teenaged Hindi-speaking boy when he was returning home after closing his shop at Kochugaon, they said.

A total of 63 non-Assamese people, mostly brick kiln workers and milkmen from Bihar, have been killed and over 40 injured in a series of attacks by the ULFA since Friday in Dibrugarh, Sibsagar, Tinsukia and Kokrajhar districts.

An ULFA cadre was killed in a shootout tonight with the army at Sepon Bazar in Sibsagar district.

Three ULFA militants on a motorcycle were asked by an army patrol to stop but they started firing. The soldiers retaliated, killing one of the militants, sources said.

The other two militants escaped in the darkness, they added.

An eerie calm prevailed in Tinsukia, where an indefinite curfew was imposed at 5 pm yesterday, and Dibrugarh, with police officials saying no untoward incidents were reported in the two districts today.

The non-Assamese people who blocked National Highway-37 with the bodies of 11 persons ended their protest this evening and performed the last rites of the dead after Mr Jaiswal gave an assurance that they would be protected, Superintendent of Police P.K. Bhuyan said.

Defying the curfew in Tinsukia, hundreds of people took to the streets with bodies yesterday and shouted slogans against the police and the government. Holding placards demanding security for the Hindi-speaking people, they blocked the highway early this morning.

Meanwhile, ULFA has reportedly blamed the government for the mayhem in eastern Asom, which resulted from the stalling of the peace process. The attack is said to have been carried out by their 28th battalion’s 3 company, which is their most potent strike force.

Soldiers in armoured vehicles patrolled Asom. The curfew was clamped across the district late on Saturday. Hundreds of protesters took to the streets in Tinsukia, raising slogans against the ULFA.