Thirteen dead in Assam clashes

Police are searching the area for the rebels

By Subir Bhaumik in Calcutta

At least 10 Indian troops and three separatist rebels have been killed in two incidents on in India's north-eastern state of Assam.

Ten soldiers of the paramilitary Assam Rifles 28th Battalion were killed in a gun battle with rebels of the outlawed United Liberation Front of Assam (Ulfa), while three guerrillas died in a later separate shootout with the Indian army.

Both the encounters took place in northern Assam, close to the border with the neighbouring state of Arunachal Pradesh.

Assam police officials told the BBC that the first attack took place at about midday local time when Ulfa rebels attacked a convoy of the Assam Rifles near a Changlang checkpoint on the state's border with Arunachal Pradesh state.

The rebels attacked the convoy with rockets, and grenades, and sprayed it with automatic rifle fire.

Soldiers from an elite Indian regiment 9th Grenadiers later raided a Ulfa hideout at Bordui in Assam's largest tea-producing district of Dibrugarh and killed three rebels.

The Indian army are searching for the guerrillas cover a wide area along Assam's border with Arunachal Pradesh.

Stalled negotiations

The encounters, observers say, indicate a breakdown of attempts to get the Ulfa to start negotiations with the Assam government or with the federal government in Delhi.

The Ulfa spokesperson, Rubi Bhuyan, told the BBC that the rebels would continue to retaliate against Indian security forces if their guerrillas continued to be attacked.

She said negotiations were only possible if the federal government agreed to discuss what she described as substantive political issues involving Assam's future.

Proposals to get the government to declare a unilateral ceasefire against the rebel forces in Assam were rejected by India's Home Minister, Lal Krishna Advani, even before the withdrawal of the ceasefire declared against the rebels in the disputed northern state of Jammu and Kashmir.