GUWAHATI: At least 111 Bhutanese nationals have been jailed in Bhutan, two of them getting life imprisonment, on charges of aiding and abetting Indian separatists.

Bhutan's government-run newspaper Kuensel said six courts in the Himalayan kingdom delivered the verdicts after "eight months of exhaustive proceedings" in which 123 people were tried as "accomplices" and "accessories" to the militants.

"Two persons received life sentence (above 20 years), five were sentenced between 15 and 18 years, 14 people from 10 to 15 years and the rest between four years and 10 years imprisonment," Kuensel said.

Seven women were among those sentenced. Those convicted include civil servants, road workers from the national work force, private workers, business people, drivers and farmers.

The newspaper said those convicted were found guilty of colluding with three outlawed Indian separatist groups -- the United Liberation Front of Asom (ULFA), the National Democratic Front of Bodoland (NDFB) and the Kamtapur Liberation Organisation (KLO).

The three rebel groups had earlier maintained well-entrenched bases inside the kingdom to carry out hit-and-run guerrilla strikes on soldiers in India's northeastern state of Assam and parts of the neighbouring state of West Bengal.

Bhutan launched a military offensive in December to evict the rebels, smashing some 30 camps. It later claimed to have ousted the militants from its territory.

"Supply of rations, transport arrangements, facilitating telephones, cash transactions, providing food and shelter, association with militants and espionage were some of the offences for which the accused were sentenced," Kuensel quoted a court spokesman as saying.

The report said in determining the sentence, 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, and whether there were multiple occurrences".

"Where such factors have been found to be present in an extreme form or in case of violations during the time of the armed conflict, the defendants have been awarded life imprisonment," Kuensel said.

The three Indian rebel groups were operating from Bhutan for the past 12 years though the Bhutanese government had repeatedly urged the militants to leave the kingdom peacefully.

The military operation came after six years of failed talks with the rebels in Bhutan, a largely Buddhist kingdom of 700,000 people which has close political ties with India.

Bhutan shares a 380-km unfenced border with Assam and West Bengal.

Indo-Asian News Service