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The Konyak Union, a tribal body in Nagaland, on Saturday demanded an apology from Union Home Minister Amit Shah for his “misleading statement” in Parliament on the killing of civilians by security forces last week, reported PTI.
On December 4, security forces had opened fire at a pick-up van carrying coal miners from the Tiru area to their village Oting in Nagaland’s Mon district, killing six on board. They mistook the group of workers for insurgents.
After the ambush, residents set the vehicles of the security forces on fire. As the soldiers fled, they shot dead more civilians, alleged Nyawang Konyak, the president of the Mon district unit of the Bharatiya Janata Party. In the chaos, seven more civilians and one soldier died. Another civilian was shot dead during an agitation the next day when protestors entered an army camp.
Shah on Monday had said that the security forces had signalled the vehicle to stop, but it had sped away. He had added that the soldiers fired upon the vehicle on the suspicion that it was carrying militants.
On Saturday, Konyak Union spokesperson T Yanlem called Shah’s statement “shameful”, and said the incident was not a case of “mistaken identity”. She demanded that the home minister retract his statement.
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