The influential Eastern Nagaland Peoples’ Organisation (ENPO) has voiced its opposition to the exploration of any mineral resources, including oil, within eastern Nagaland.

On April 21, Assam chief minister Himanta Biswa Sarma and his Nagaland counterpart Neiphiu Rio had agreed in principle to go ahead with oil exploration along the disputed inter-state border for mutual economic benefit.

The ENPO, the apex body of seven tribal organisations from eastern Nagaland spearheading the movement for a separate state, announced its opposition to the proposed move in a one-paragraph statement on Tuesday.

The ENPO said it would not allow extraction/exploration of any mineral resources within eastern Nagaland region in accordance with an earlier public resolution that “still stands firm and resolute”.

A senior ENPO leader in a text message to The Telegraph said the resolution was adopted in 2015 against the extraction of mineral resources.

It is not only the ENPO that is opposing the proposed move.

On April 23, the Naga National Political Groups (NNPGs), an umbrella body of seven insurgent groups from Nagaland involved in peace parleys with the Centre to resolve the Indo-Naga political issue besides the NSCN (I-M), had opposed the oil exploration bid.

The working group of the NNPGs in a statement on Sunday demanded that Rio “withdraw” from any MoU with Assam on disturbed, unresolved boundary areas and mineral exploration attempts therein.

The NNPGs asserted any MoU signed at this “present crucial juncture would be considered a direct attempt to sell off Naga rights and warned that the consequences would be widespread and unimaginable”.

The Assam-Nagaland border is 512.1km long.

The inter-state border disputes date back to 1963 when the state of Nagaland was carved out of Assam. Five Assam districts — Jorhat, Sivasagar, Charaideo, Golaghat and Karbi Anglong — are located along the Nagaland border.