G Vinayak in Guwahati

Despite strong reservations, Manipur Chief Minister O Ibobi Singh has acceded to the Centre's request about lifting the official ban on the National Socialist Council of Nagalim-Isak/Muivah, although the cases against several top leaders of the outfit in Manipur will continue to stay, official sources in Imphal said.

The decision, these sources said, was taken to facilitate the ongoing peace talks.

Till Friday evening Ibobi Singh was adamant that Manipur will not lift the ban on the Naga outfit. But New Delhi's [ Images ] persistent request to create a conducive atmosphere for the proposed political level talks between the Centre and the NSCN-IM, scheduled for mid-December, made the Manipur government change its mind.

The decision to lift the ban was taken during a high-level meeting presided over by Singh and attended by senior officials including Chief Secretary A P Sharma, DGP (Manipur) S Bimolchandra Singh and Principal Secretary (Home) D S Poonia late on Friday night.

Later addressing newspersons at his office, the Chief Minister remarked that even though Central Government allowed the ban period to lapse to create a conducive atmosphere for the peace talks, FIRs lodged against Thuingaleng Muivah and other NSCN-IM cadres is still in force and will be applicable whenever the need arose.

The law and order situation in the state in the wake of the recent attacks on security forces, including the November 20 incident in which insurgents had gunned down seven CRPF personnel in Bishenpur district, also came up for review during the meeting.

Meanwhile, buoyed by the positive development in the Naga peace talks, the Centre has now decided to push for negotiations with all insurgent groups in the northeast and has chosen former rebel and now Mizoram Chief Minister Zoramthanga to help it out.

According to reports from Mizoram capital Aizawl and New Delhi, Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee [ Images ] and Deputy Prime Minister Lal Kishenchand Advani [ Images ] have asked Zoramthanga to help bring all militant outfits of the northeast to the negotiation table.

According to official estimates there are at least 50-odd militant groups active across the seven states of the region.

Zoramthanga, a former insurgent leader of the Mizo National Front, is already playing an active role in the Naga peace talks. He has twice traveled to Bangkok in recent times as special representative of the prime minister to extend an invitation to the NSCN-IM leadership to visit New Delhi.

Reports from New Delhi quoted Zoramthanga as saying: "I told them that I would be happy to be instrumental in ending bloodshed and bringing peace anywhere."

He added that he was working out the details for the talks at the political level with the NSCN-IM in the capital in December. He suggested to the Centre and the NSCN-IM leadership that the opinion of the Naga people should be taken into consideration before the outfit put forward its demands, as was done in the case of the Mizo accord.

"The political demands made by the Naga underground outfit should be the demands of the Naga people, not the demands of the rebels," he said.  Zoram thanga had spent 20 years in the jungles as head of the Mizo National Army, the armed wing of the MNF as deputy of the legendary Mizo rebel leader Laldenga before coming overground in 1986 following the Mizo peace accord.