Three Army personnel were injured when unidentified terrorists fired at the security force’s camp in Kakopathar area in Assam’s Tinsukia district early on Friday, a defence spokesperson said. The Army and the police have launched a search operation in the area to arrest the terrorists, he said. “Around 12.30 am, unidentified terrorists fired at the Kakopathar Company location from a moving vehicle. The troops on duty retaliated immediately and effectively took caution to avoid collateral damage to civilian houses in the vicinity,” the Army spokesperson said.
The immediate response from.the Army forced the terrorists to abandon the attack and flee, the Army said, adding a search operation has been launched to track down and capture them. According to sources, the terrorists were from banned terror group ULFA (I), or the United Liberation Front of Asom (Independent), and used grenade launchers and automatic rifles. This region of Assam used to feature often in news headlines due to significant terrorist activities but, for the past several years, the area has been peaceful.
No ULFA (I) activity has been reported.This morning’s attack, sources said, may have been in response to recent operations in the Indo-Myanmar area in which some ULFA terrorists were shot. Meanwhile, on Thursday, an Assam Rifles CoB, or Company Operating Base, in Arunachal Pradesh’s Changlang district was attacked. Two soldiers were injured in the strike attributed to terrorists from the NSCN-KY (A), a faction of the National Socialist Council of Nagaland.
