Guwahati: Side by side with mopping up operations by the Royal Bhutan Army (RBA), the Forces are now concentrating on burning down the dislodged camps of the ULFA (United Liberation Front of Assam), NDFB (National Democratic Front of Bodoland) and KLO (Kamtapur Liberation Organisation) in Bhutan.

According to an official source at Thimphu, the RBA had burnt down several camps and had cleared the adjoining areas of the Manas National park. Crown Prince Jigme Khesar Namgyal Wangchuck has undertaken a tour of the operation areas.

The ULFA camp at Goborkonda, as stated by Army Chief of Staff Gen N C Vij at a press conference in Guwahati recently, has been destroyed and was burnt down, the sources said.

While the RBA claims to have destroyed all the 30 camps on its soil, Army authorities in Guwahati said the Lechung camps were yet to be busted.

Meanwhile, the NDFB has ruled out any possibility of holding talks with the Centre and accused the Government of waging a proxy war against the outfit in Bhutan.

In a statement faxed to a prominent local English daily last night (Jan 4, 2004), the NDFB's chairman Nabla Daimari echoed the views of Paresh Baruah, the ULFA commander-in-chief when he said that despite the setbacks in the Himalayan kingdom, the outfit would emerge as a strong force again and continue its "liberation struggle".

The NDFB chairman said that the solution to the problem lay only in sincere and meaningful dialogue and freedom of the Bodo people and all other nationalities.

"Right now we are not in touch with any agent of the Centre for talks and when the Centre is engaged in proxy war with us in Bhutan, we will not hold any talks," Daimari said.

He also rejected the general amnesty offer by Assam Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi saying such offers would not help in solving the problem.

Giving an account of the RBA crackdown, the NDFB chief said, talks are going on with the Bhutan Government to solve the problem "amicably" as "we had good relations with the RBA personnel".

He alleged that at the time when talks were on, the RBA attacked the ULFA, NDFB and KLO without any warning at the behest of the Government of India.

Denying that the outfit had received any ultimatum from the Royal Bhutan Government to leave its soil, Daimary wondered how the Bhutan Government expected them to read the ultimatum, if any, in the national daily 'Kuensel' within 48 hours inside the jungles.