Crimes against the state
From Bhutannica
In September 2004, 111 people were sentenced for collaborating with the Indian separatist militants.
111 people including seven women were sentenced to prison terms ranging from four years to life imprisonment in connection with aiding and abetting the ULFA, NDFB and KLO militants when they were illegally camped in Bhutan.
Two people received life sentence (above 20 years), five people were sentenced from 15 to 18 years, 14 people from 10 to 15 years and rest from four years to 10 years in accordance with the provisions of the National Security Act of Bhutan, 1992. One person is still under trial at the Samdrup Jongkhar court.
The convicted include civil servants, road workers from the national work force, private workers, business people, drivers and farmers.
Supply of rations, livestock and other goods, facilitating and registering of vehicles and two wheelers, transport arrangements and carriage by mules, facilitating telephones and fax, sheltering and providing food, receiving cash and loans and facilitating cash transfers, providing storage facilities, association with militants, espionage, receiving gratification were some of the offenses on which the convicted were sentenced according to a court spokesman.
The sentences were pronounced simultaneously on September 2 and 3 by the various dzongkhag and dungkhag courts in Samdrup Jongkhar, Pemagatshel, Sarpang, Gelephu, Phuentsholing and Thimphu where the defendants were tried as "accomplices" and "accessories" to the militants.
The Samdrup Jongkhar dzongkhag court convicted 34 people, Sarpang, 33, Gelephu, 26, Thimphu, 11, Phuentsholing, four, and Pemagatshel, three.
According to a court spokesperson, the courts took into consideration "the degree to which the violation threatened the security and national interest, the volume of commerce or assistance involved and the extent of planning or sophistication, and whether there were multiple occurrences" in determining the sentence.
"Where such factors have been found to be present in an extreme form or in case of violations during the time of armed conflict, the defendants have been awarded life imprisonment," said the spokesperson. "The persons found guilty were thus sentenced on the basis of certainty and fairness to avoid unwarranted disparity among offenders."
The government began arresting people suspected of assisting the militants soon after the military operations in December last year.
"The heinous crime of aiding and abetting the militants for personal monetary gain and seriously harming the national interest is a crime against the state," said the spokesperson. "Therefore knowingly and intentionally aiding and abetting a crime against the state is the worst offense that a citizen can commit and nothing can redress for it."
The spokesperson explained that although generally there was no liability under criminal law unless there is a guilty mind, the plea by defendants that they were not aware of the likely harm or did not have conscious intent to jeopardise national security and sovereignty by rendering assistance to the militants was not a valid defense. "Ignorance of the law, does not excuse anyone that is of the age of discretion and of sound mind from the penalty of the breach of it," said the spokesperson.
The National Security Act of 1992 states that "if any individual should infringe the statute law of the country through ignorance, greed or carelessness, he must abide by the consequences of his error".
The illegal presence of the Indian militants was extensively debated in the National Assembly since 1997 after the government came to know that the Indian militants had clandestinely infiltrated into the country across the porous border and were taking sanctuary in the Bhutanese forests.
In 1999, the National Assembly resolved to punish all those who assist the militants according to the National Security Act.
Military operations against the militants were launched in December last year after every effort by His Majesty the King and the government to resolve the problem of the illegal presence of the militants from Assam and West Bengal through peaceful means over the past six years had failed.
During the recent 82nd session of the National Assembly, Assembly members unanimously called for those found guilty of extending any form of assistance to the militants to be tried and sentenced without clemency.
"The grave concern of His Majesty the King, the great distress of the government and the serious anguish of the people had been repeatedly and consistently voiced through the resolutions of the National Assembly. It resulted in a military operation by a peace loving kingdom. Unfortunately, the situation was aggravated by the irresponsible actions of these Bhutanese citizens," said the court spokesman.