NSCN(I-M) general secretary Thuingaleng Muivah will be provided tight security during his forthcoming visit to Nagaland following a death threat issued by a rival militant outfit in the state.

Sources in the Home Ministry said that Muivah has already been given security in the bungalow where he has been lodged. “After an evaluation of the risks, more security would be given to him during his trip to Nagaland,” the source said.

Muivah is likely to spend the New Year’s at the organisation’s headquarters — Camp Hebron in Dimapur. The date and the duration of his stay would be finalised shortly by the NSCN(I-M) delegation that has arrived from Nagaland.

NSCN(K), headed by Myanmar-based S S Khaplang, has said that the general secretary would be targeted if he landed in Nagaland. The threat is being taken seriously since the two factions have been involved in a bloody turf war since the past several years that further escalated in the last couple of months.

NSCN (I-M) is regarded the strongest outfit in the state in terms of cadres and support. Last year, the decision by the Naga National Council, which is headed by London-based Adino Phizo, to join hands with NSCN(K) has slightly altered the scenario resulting in more conflicts between these groups.

Both the factions were originally part of the same group — NSCN — before it split in 1989 over the issue of leadership. The top leaders of both these factions had objected to the signing of the Shillong Accord ( 1975) by the Naga National Council with the government and had decided to float a new organisation that could carry on the struggle for a sovereign state of Nagaland.