Guwahati, Jan 5 (PTI): Hopes of holding formal peace talks with the banned ULFA have brightened with the Centre's interlocutor today indicating that the dialogue may begin in the next few weeks, ahead of the Assam Assembly polls.
Centre's interlocutor PC Haldar said the government and the ULFA leadership were inching closer to start the parleys for bringing a lasting peace into the Northeastern State.
"We have moved a little further. Now, I think, we are closer to the stage where we should start the formal peace process," Haldar, a former chief of the Intelligence Bureau, said here.
Peace talks with ULFA may give a political boost to Congress party - which has been ruling Assam for the past ten years - before the Assembly elections likely to be held in April-May. "There are one or two things which remain to be tied up."
