Nepal king appoints team for talks with Maoists Times of India, India Headed by the king's deputy Kirti Nidhi Bista, vice chairman of the council of ministers, the team also includes two new ministers ..... Home Minister Kamal Thapa and Land Reforms and Management Minister Narayan Singh Pun ..... A day after his appointment, Pun said in his maiden press conference that he would personally take an initiative to start peace parleys. .... Pun, a former colonel of the Royal Nepalese Army, had played an important role in 2003 when he single-handedly brought the insurgents to the table for talks. .... Gyanendra had been hoping to receive an invitation to visit New Delhi from Indian Foreign Secretary Shyam Saran...... But after Saran did not convey any such message from Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, the king formed the talks team as a second line of strategy..... the new talks team was formed not so much to bring peace to violence-torn Nepal but to create misunderstanding between the Maoists and the opposition parties..... With the Maoists having vowed to disrupt the polls and the opposition parties having begun a campaign asking people to abstain from voting, the king could be looking at new strategies.
Nepal king appoints team for talks with Maoists Hindustan Times, India
These two news items in the Indian media caught my attention. Curiously this has not been covered in the Nepali media. How come? If this is valid news, as I have reason to believe it is, I do take it positively, though with reservations.
If the king is serious about peace, he needs to do two things immediately.
- He needs to reciprocate the Maoist ceasefire immediately.
- He needs to accept the concept of a constituent assembly.
I doubt the Maoists will respond unless the conditions like in Pun's 2003 are recreated. That would be the first step. If the peace talks offers be unconditional, I am sure the Maoists will respond. Why? Because it is their idea to hold a roundtable conference of all three forces. So if they can start with two of them, they will have the option to expand it and invite the third force, the seven party coalition.
I am cautiously optimistic. I commend the king for this move.
Only a day or two before Kamal Thapa made news by suggesting a major happening is in the works. This might be it.
Pun has some credibility on this count. Within the parameters available to him, he did some important work in 2003, though ultimately fruitless. It is possible Pun might have been in touch with the Maoists even before he joined the cabinet a few days ago. His abduction into the cabinet might have been with the express intent to open up a channel with the Maoists.
The two things I have suggested the king do, why would he do that? One, he has no choice. Two, it really is in his best interests. Three, there are no other outlets for the country.
You can not have peace talks if you are still officially at war.
As for constituent assembly, it is a vague, elaborate term, it can have many shapes. Just look at some of the options.
- A constituent assembly that guarantees a ceremonial monarchy, the guarantee resting with the Supreme Court even before elections to that assembly are held. The army would be detached from the monarchy.
- A constituent assembly where the monarchy is an open question.
- A constituent assembly that takes shape only after the monarchy has been abolished. So the assembly does not even debate the issue. The assembly functions within a republican framework.
The king's second best option would be to shoot for an all party government that also includes all the royalist parties, and then go for an assembly. He might win the vote.
It is my analysis though that the parties and the Maoists will be okay with the first option if they can have the rest.
And there is no clash. The king has time and again said he is not for an absolute monarchy, that this is the 21st century, and so the monarchy has to be for democracy. If he is honest on that, the first option is precisely what he would seek, I would think. He does not lose with the first option. He gets what he wants. And the other two forces also get what they want. Peace is back. Democracy is back. The Maoists disarm. Everyone ends up happy.
That is why the roundtable conference is so important.
On 2/1 he asked for three years maximum, as in if he can return the country to normalcy in less than three years, he would do so. This is his opportunity to take less than three years.
If, on the other hand, he keeps moving towards the February 8 polls like a rhino, I see the possibility of the Maoists perhaps breaking away from the seven parties in trying to violently disrupt the polls. That would be tragic. A whole new scenario would emerge.
A party like the Maoists are can not afford to take too many U turns. They already have taken a major U turn. They should not be asked to take a second one.
Kamal Thapa, by the way, looks like Suresh Oberoi, have you noticed?
Personally I have a lot of faith in Narayan Singh Pun to pull this off. If he failed in 2003, it was because the talks back then were not unconditional. The parameters he was functioning in were flawed. It was not lack of skills on his part that brought the talks down. The king should provide the parameters this time, and Pun should get down to work.
In The News
No truce from govt, says govt spokesperson Kantipur
INSEC urges China, India, US not to supply arms
SC to decide RCCC's fate on Jan 5
Moriarty back; meets Koirala, Nepal
Alliance ready for Naya Baneshwor mass meet
Media ordinance legal cover for unlawful practices: ICJ
Govt returns Radio Sagarmatha equipment
'Political breakthrough a must for lasting peace'
AIN calls for long-term ceasefire
No change in Indian stance: Saran
SC says no to petition against polls
1 comment:
Regarding this statement,”He needs to reciprocate the Maoist ceasefire immediately.”
Wouldn’t that mean the King and Royal Nepal Army should begin massive kidnappings, low grade military attacks, school closures and ransom collections.
Despite the so-called cease fire, that is what the Maoists are doing. Reciprocate means to return in kind. Lets hope the King doesn’t take your advice.
Perhaps you missed these story: Interesting to note that Maoists are against local control of schools. Of course being controlled by Internationalists from London the Maoists are totally against native control. WAKE UP BEFORE YOU ARE COLONIZED BY EUROPE AND THE UN!!!
Killings continue in Nepal even during ceasefire Published:
Wednesday, 7 December, 2005, 08:25 AM Doha Time
“The Maoists have abducted over 8,000 civilians, forcibly recruited
children, tormented and displaced army families and extorted money
during the so-called truce,”
http://www.gulf-times.com/site/topics/article.asp?
cu_no=2&item_no=63627&version=1&template_id=44&parent_id=24
KATHMANDU: Blood continues to be spilled in Nepal despite the Maoist
guerrillas extending their ceasefire with at least six people being
killed in four days.
The latest incident late Monday was reported from Dhuwankot village
in northwestern Nepal’s Gorkha district, home of Maoist leader and
architect-turned-rebel Baburam Bhattarai, with two guerrillas being
killed in what the army described as an exchange of fire.
Prakash Pokhrel and Shiva Karakheti aka Biraj were killed after a
patrol came under bomb attack, the state media said.
Three Maoists were killed on December 2, the day Maoist supremo
Pushpa Kamal Dahal aka Prachanda issued a statement saying his banned
Communist Party of Nepal-Maoist had decided to extend their three-
month unilateral ceasefire by another month out of respect for
people’s desire for peace and to create an atmosphere conducive to a
political solution.
The army said it had lost a soldier the same day when he was hit by
an improvised explosive device planted by the guerrillas.
Meanwhile, Nepal’s army chief has accused Maoist rebels of continued
attacks, abductions and killings despite announcing a unilateral
ceasefire.
General Pyar Jung Thapa said the military was determined to crush the
insurgency, dismissing their four-month-old ceasefire as “crooked
tricks” and a “ploy.”
“The Maoists have abducted over 8,000 civilians, forcibly recruited
children, tormented and displaced army families and extorted money
during the so-called truce,” a military statement released yesterday
quoted Thapa telling troops in eastern Nepal on Monday.
On Friday, Nepal’s insurgent Maoists extended a three-month
unilateral ceasefire by one month, a move welcomed by the Human
rights groups accuse both the Maoists and the Royal Nepalese Army of
abuses that include torture.
The Maoists and seven mainstream opposition parties agreed last month
to form an anti-royal alliance to restore democracy in the troubled
Himalayan kingdom.
The European Union and the Swiss government hailed the truce
extension by the rebels and urged the government to reciprocate. –
Agencies
Maoists Force Closure Of Some 500 Schools In Nepal
KATHMANDU, Dec 15 (Bernama) — Tens of thousands of children in western Nepal are being deprived of their right to study after Maoists forcibly closed some 500 schools, the Press Trust of India (PTI) reported, quoting sources close to the teachers’ association in the Himalayan Kingdom.
Despite their extension of unilateral ceasefire till January 2, the Maoists have forced the closure of 500 schools in Dhading, a district 70 km west of Kathmandu for indefinite period, the sources close to Nepal Teachers Association said.
Tens of thousands of students are deprived of their right to study after the schools were closed from Sunday, they said.
The schools were closed following a strike by the Maoist-affiliated All Nepal National Teachers Organisation demanding that temporary teachers be made permanent and also annulment of teachers license provision.
Earlier, the pro-Maoist students organisation had closed down the schools opposing the government’s decision to hand over school management to the local community.
December 15th, 2005 at 6:12 pm M. Brannon:
RIM has strong ties to both the “afghansis” and the São Paulo Forum.
An amalgam of nominally Maoist terrorist organizations and guerrilla
movements, it was founded in London in 1984. For years, its
headquarters and publishing operations were located in the Russell
House in Nottingham, England, named for the late Lord Bertrand
Russell. RIM’s journal, A World to Win, was published for years by
Russell Press, an affiliate of the one-worldist Bertrand Russell Peace
Foundation.
To this day, RIM enjoys the protection of the British Crown. Its
current offices are located in London, which French government
officials have recently labeled the “headquarters for world terrorism.”
http://www.larouchepub.com/other/1995/2246_rim_intro.html
The British role in creating Maoism
http://www.larouchepub.com/other/1995/2246_british_and_maoism.html
Old article on Nepal’s Maoist History
Nepali CP looks
to armed revolution
by Ramtanu Maitra and Susan Maitra
Unlike any other member of the London-based Revolutionary
International Movement, the Communist Party of Nepal (CPN) succeeded
in coming into power, ruling this strategically placed Himalayan
State, which borders both China and India, from 1994 through August
1995. Under the direction of former Prime Minister Man Mohan Adhikari,
the CPN is a power to reckon with, and will remain so for some time.
The nearby “Naxalite” parties of West Bengal in India, which are also
formal and informal members of RIM, have largely submerged themselves
into tribal and peasant insurgent movements, and continue as a dormant
capability.
The Nepali communist movement is a product of the early 1950s. It
started at a time when the landlord class, the Ranas, dominated
Nepal’s socio-political system, including the monarchy. Together with
the democratic movement under the Nepali Congress party, the
communists were a part of the anti-Rana movement, but unlike the
Congress party, began drawing on the support of China, which had
become communist in 1949.
The movement received a setback in 1960, when the ten-year-old
democratic system that freed Nepal from the vise-like grip of the
Ranas came to an end. King Mahendra dismissed the duly elected
government of the Nepali Congress party, arrested Prime Minister B.P.
Koirala and most of his colleagues, and announced a new “partyless
panchayat system” which continued into 1990. All parties were banned.
The CPN went underground, but was less seriously hampered than the
formerly ruling Congress party. CPN meetings were held within Nepal,
party manifestos were freely distributed, and journals reflecting the
views of various of its factions were regularly published.
Beijing vs. Delhi
It is not clear why the CPN enjoyed these privileges that were not
granted to the Congress party. But, there is no question that King
Mahendra, in the wake of growing tensions between India and China, was
getting closer to the militarily more powerful Beijing, and it is no
secret that Beijing had close contacts with the CPN. Those were, of
course, still the days when Mao Zedong was chanting “the eastern sky
is red,” and pro-China forces were furnished with arms and money
throughout South Asia, including Nepal.
Soon, however, the CPN went through the split which hit almost every
communist party in the region, in the wake of the growing animus
between Moscow and Beijing. In the case of the CPN, one of the
founders of the communist movement, Pushpa Lal Shrestha, became the
flag bearer of the extreme Maoist brand. The differences between the
two factions, which were branded as moderate and extremist, centered
on relations with the monarchy. Pushpa Lal Shrestha opposed any
trucking with the monarchy.
It was evident, however, that Beijing was not quite ready to take
sides with Pushpa Lal and forsake King Mahendra, who was issuing
increasingly anti-India statements, to the chagrin of New Delhi. The
conflict led to Pushpa Lal fleeing Nepal, and his expulsion from the
party in 1962. The “royalist” wing of the party, led by Keshar Jang
Rayamajhi and Shailendra Kumar Upadhyay, managed to keep control and
maintain a delicate balance of the party’s loyalty between the
monarchy in Kathmandu, and Mao’s men in Beijing.
The 1969 release of the future prime minister and landowner from
Biratnagar, Man Mohan Adhikari, probably the only CPN leader with
sufficient stature to gain support of all party factions, was an
important factor in providing the much-needed stimulus for reuniting
and revitalizing the party. As a result of all this, Pushpa Lal
Shrestha was brought back.
The 1970s was a period of consolidation and retrospection for the CPN,
as it was elsewhere for the communist parties in South Asia following
the devastating impact of the brutal Cultural Revolution in China.
Even during this period, the differences within the party hierarchy
became evident. In 1971, during the uprising in East Pakistan which
led to the birth of Bangladesh, the pro-Moscow Rayamajhi and the
Maoist Pushpa Lal hailed the uprising as the “freedom struggle,” but
the pro-Beijing Man Mohan Adhikari saw the struggle as “an aggression
of India.”
New conflicts planned
The CPN continues to have close relations with North Korea, as do
several other members of RIM. During the 1994 elections, the posters,
manifestos, and pamphlets of the CPN were reportedly printed in
Pyongyang and distributed in Nepal.
Despite its democratic face, the CPN is not a passive Communist Party.
In the Himalayan foothills, where Nepal meets India, is the area
called the terai. Because of the climate and “business opportunities,”
which often means smuggling contraband from one country to another
across virtually unmanned borders, the face of the CPN in the terai
resembles that of the neighboring militants in the Naxalbari area of
West Bengal, India, the so-called Naxalites. The CPN believes that it
shares the destiny of armed revolution that the Naxalites attempted in
West Bengal.
As the terai is the most politically conscious region in Nepal, and
has been a traditional base for both the Nepali Congress party and the
CPN, there is every likelihood that the CPN will choose the area as
its point of conflict. The CPN’s strong anti-India image fits into
this situation as well.
http://www.larouchepub.com/other/1995/2246_nepali_cp.html
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