India security forces kill dozens in order to crush the left rebels

The security forces killed at least 27 people in the center of India on Wednesday, in an operation which, according to the police, had targeted Maoist activists, while the authorities intensify a military campaign aimed at defeating the old left insurrection of the country.

Prabhat Kumar, chhattisgarh state police chief, said that “several Maoist level executives was killed or seriously injured in the operation on Wednesday. The local media reported that a senior rebels leader, Nambala Keshav Rao, who goes to Basavaraju, was among those who were killed.

Last week, in another bloody confrontation, the government said that it had killed 31 members of the movement in a hilly region between Chhattisgarh and a neighboring state.

Amit Shah, Minister of India, described this operation as “historic breakthrough”. He established a deadline for March to destroy the entire insurrection, which has raged unnecessarily for more than 50 years.

Human rights activists warned the possibility that innocent civilians were killed in the campaign against the rebels. Bela Bhatia, a lawyer who works in regions affected by the insurrection, said that if the rapid identification of the bodies by family members was crucial, the government has often taken days to present corpses.

She also said that when the Indian government claimed to have killed insurgents, it was not clear if “the killed Maoists went and were then killed, or if they died during a meeting”.