India prepares to return refugees

Press, Volume CXI, Issue 32797, 23 December 1971, Page 13

India prepares to return refugees

(N.Z. Press Association—Copyright)

NEW DELHI, December 22. Indian Government officials were working today to restore* damaged road and rail links into the former territory of East Pakistan to start the mass movement of close to ten million war refugees back to their homeland, United Press International reported.

Officials in Calcutta said that the railway; line between India’s West 1 Bengal state and the' western sector district town of Jessore was be-' ing repaired and that! roads were also being! worked on with Indian! assistance. Both were damaged in the fighting before and during the 14-day war between India and Pakistan. The officials said that as soon as the communications links were working once again, mass movement of refugees under supervision of I the Indian Government and the new Bangla Desh Government would begin. Check points were being established for the purpose, they said. A spokesman for the West Bengal Government said that more than 70,000 of the East

Bengali refugees had left' camps along the border and moved back into their home-i land on their own since the' surrender of Pakistani forces' last week. They were mostly villagers! who lived in border areas, the spokesman said. West Ben-i gal has about seven million! of the total of close to 10' million refugees. A U.P.I. correspondent, Kenneth Braddick, reported from the former East Pakistan capital of Dacca that thousands of refugees were streaming into the city on Tuesday on the rooftops of packed buses and in crowded I riverboats. I Braddick said that Indian officials reported that reprisals by enraged Bengalis against non-Bengali Moslems accused of collaborating with the Pakistani occupation authorities had been reduced sharply since action against arms-carrying guerrillas in the city.

: “Many collaborators have been killed throughout Bangla Desh,” an Indian offi;;cer told Braddick. “The Bengalis also settled old scores among themselves.” • “We are now moving ' I quickly to get back all loose i! firearms by December 25,” the officer said. “Only regu- , lar soldiers will carry wea--1 pons.” ’ The official ali-India Radio > quoted the chief civil servant i of the Bangla Desh GovemJ ment, the Secretary-General (Mr Ruhul Quddus), as say- , ing yesterday that Pakistani . troops murdered at least 280 . intellectuals throughout the ’ former East Pakistan in a J two-day “operation mast sacre” shortly before their I surrender. t On the political front, , chances for any early start of peace talks between India and Pakistan t appeared doubtful. President Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto was reported to have said in Rawalpindi that he would consult with China before going into any talks.

Senior Indian Government sources said it appeared that Bhutto had not made up his mind what course he would take toward India and that he was keeping his options open. They said the feeling in New Delhi was that it would be one to two months before talks could start. Mr Bhutto announced yesterday that the East Bengali nationalist leader, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, had been moved from prison and was under house arrest in West Pakistan. Sheikh Mujibur has been in custody since the start of the East Pakistan civil war and was put on trial for treason by the Government of the former President, Field Marshal Agha Mohammed Yahya Khan. The Press Trust of India (P.T.1.) reported it was told . yesterday in an interview by the Bangla Dish Government ! Prime Minister, Mr Tajuddin I Ahmed, that the acting President, Mr Syed Nazrul Islam, and other Cabinet members planned to reach Dacca today. Mr Ahmed said that the Cabinet would begin functioning immediately.

India and Pakistan were on notice today from the Security Council to maintain “a durable cease-fire and cessation of all hostilities in all areas of conflict.” The 15-nation council, approving a substantive resolution for the first time since the conflict broke out two weeks ago, also demanded troop withdrawals “as soon as practicable.” Thirteen members voted for the resolution, which grew out of intensive private consultations. Russia and Poland abstained. Though voting for it, China called the draft highly unsatisfactory. Despite the agreement of India and Pakistan to the text, each side made it clear after the vote that its interpretation differed from the other’s.