Dhaka: Altogether 33 assault and automatic rifles and a light machine gun that were being smuggled to Bangladesh from Burma via India have been seized by Indian police on Thursday and Friday.
The police and Assam Rifles in India seized arms and ammunitions including 33 automatic rifles from a farm house near Lemgpui Airport in Izol, the capital of Mizoram state in India in two raids.
It was seized whilst waiting to be smuggled to Bangladesh, said a report.
Three people, suspected to be members of a Bangladeshi insurgent outfit, were arrested.
The arrested were identified as Robi Chakma, Soboz Chakma and Moni Tripura.
The report quoted the Superintendent of Police, CID (Crime), Joseph Lalchhuana saying 23 AK-47 assault rifles, a Browning automatic rifle and a light machine gun being routed from Myanmar to Bangladesh were seized near Lengpui airport on Thursday and another eight AK-47 rifles on Friday.
Also seized were 86 rounds of AK-47 ammunition, 24 rounds of LMG ammunition and 699 rounds of ammunition for the Browning automatic rifle.
Mizoram is one of the eight north-eastern provinces of India, located across the Bangladeshi border of Chittagong hill district. It shares a 722 kilometer boundary with Burma and Bangladsh of which 318 kms is with the latter country.
