HIMALAYAN MOUNTAIN BIKE RACE SERIES p8-9 Ashmina Ranjit #119 15 - 21 November 2002 16 pages Rs 25 in Japan p15 EXCLUSIVE Mahara on CNN Chief Maoist negotiator in the failed peace talks last year, Krishna Bahadur Mahara, spoke on camera to CNN from an unspecified hideout. Mahara flatly denies the Maoists are recruiting children and PeaceniksActivists launch campaign against onmilitary aid warpath to Nepal. killing civilians, and tries to use the deadlock between the king and the political parties to his BHAGIRATH○○○○○○○○ YOGI○○○○○○○○○○○○ The reverberations of the conflict are no survived after winning a confidence vote in armed insurgency in 1996 lead us to the advantage. Highlights: ore than 600 people, mostly western more confined to Nepali hills and valleys. August, but the weapons will not be opposite conclusion,” claimed the ANHS. Are you terrorists: scholars and peace activists based in Buoyed by increasingly convergent world supplied until after Belgium’s parliamentary The association has posted the petition on “We are a political opinion against terrorism, former prime elections in November. the web (www.petitiononline.com/ force and do not M the US and Europe, have signed a support terrorism. We petition urging US lawmakers to stop military minister Sher Bahadur Deuba travelled to The Association of Nepal and demonepa/petition.html) for signatures. condemn all types aid to Nepal. Dozens of Nepali rights activists Washington and London in May this year Himalayan Studies (ANHS) at a one-day “It is our considered view that military of terrorism. This and development workers have also seeking military assistance. conference, “War on Terrorism: War as aid will not help bring about a negotiated is a people’s joined in. Nearly a month after Terrorism” at the University of Wisconsin’s settlement, but instead deepen and prolong an movement, a people’s war. It is a people’s the London meeting of donors South Asia Centre on 12 October adopted a already devastating civil war. Rather than force. We are not terrorists and that is to Nepal (June 19-20), the petition to be sent to the United States increase the chances for Nepal to achieve a clear.” British government announced an aid government calling for a halt to the planned peaceful functioning Why do you recruit children: “We have no children in our fighting force. We package of £ 6.5 million to procure two military aid. The petitioners said the aid democracy in the Editorial p2 do not admit anyone below 18 in our army. helicopters as well as provide training and “could resolve nothing and would do untold foreseeable future, Reaction and This is a baseless allegation.” other logistics for the Royal Nepal Army. harm both to innocent Nepalis and to the such aid will only revolution Why do you kill civilians: “The The Bush administration announced in prospects for a political resolution to the aggravate the present allegation of Maoists killing civilians is August that it would provide a supple- insurgency.” conflict, leaving Nepal and the region to cope also false. In fact the government is mental $20 million as military aid to In its 2 August 2002 decision, the US with unintended repercussions and untold responsible for all those killings.” Nepal to buy “non-lethal” equipment and government said the $20 million emergency suffering far into the future,” says the ANHS. Prospects for talks: “The reason the government is opposing talks is that it is services for the army. “supplemental funding” would force the Those who signed the petition come from preparing for a full-fledged war. If the But things don’t seem to be moving Maoists to decide that a military victory is not a wide spectrum. Interestingly, their diversity is government agrees to a political solution, exactly the way Nepal would like. There has possible and that negotiations provide the best reflected not only in their understanding of the we are even ready for a ceasefire.” been reaction against military aid to Nepal. hope for realising their goals. The petitioners issue, but also in the way they lobby for a Prospects for peace: “The whole Belgian Health Minister Magda Aelvoet do not agree. “Our collective experience in “noble” cause. There are many names world is putting pressure for peace talks, resigned over the proposed sale of 5,500 the study of Nepali society and our close recognised in Nepal as scholars of experience, and then an interim government. In such a automatic rifles to Nepal. The government attention to the course of events since the and also a few who seemd to have “walked” situation, the king does not have any other of Prime Minister Guy Verhofstadt commencement of the CPN (Maoist)’s into the website and signed on. see p6 possibility but to take these talks forward.” " responsible political system landed him a 14-month prison sen- tence. Shaha never served in a public post after that, but became Weekly Internet Poll # 59 Rishikesh Shaha, 77 prolific as a scholar. He was a visiting professor at the Jawaharlal Q. Which of the following offers the best solution to Nehru University and Regent’s Professor at the University of the present political impasse: Nepal’s scholar-statesman Rishikesh Shaha died Thursday shortly after Calfornia at Berkeley. His books, most notably, Nepali Politics: DEEPAK THAPA had visited him and written this tribute. We print this piece Retrospect and Prospect, Essays in the Practice of Govern- in the present tense to keep Shaha’s memory alive. ment in Nepal and Modern Nepal: A Political History have become standard reference works, while his Introduction to here is something particularly winsome about an ailing old man lighting up and Nepal and Heroes and Builders of Nepal provide perhaps giving you a smile of welcome. That is how Rishikesh Shaha greets you when you the best introduction to the country. T enter his room. After the initial shock of seeing how wasted he looks, the first thing Rishikesh Shaha’s deep commitment to the issue of that strikes you is the dhaka topi that somehow remains perched on his head even in personal freedom was evident when he founded and led repose. Then the sadness creeps over you as you realise that there lies a piece of Nepali the Human Rights Organisation of Nepal in 1988; no history, and he is dying of lung cancer. mean feat during the authoritarian Panchayat days. He While working with Himal South Asian, we used to describe Rishikesh Shaha as later left the organisation but did not relent in his own interim all-party government Nepal’s scholar-statesman, and I doubt if there is any other Nepali who can share that personal crusade against injustice. constituent assembly elections designation. Just look at his accomplishments. A founding member of the Nepal In recent years, Shaha was accused of being an reinstatement of parliament Democratic Congress, one of the constituents which later became the Nepali Congress, apologist for the Maoists because of his friendship none of the above Total votes: 1,885 he later sided with Dilli Raman Regmi in the Nepali National Congress, and was even with Baburam Bhattarai, with whom he corre- part of the People’s Front together with Tanka Prasad Acharya’s Praja Parishad and the sponded even after Bhattarai went underground. Weekly Internet Poll # 60. To vote go to: www.nepalitimes.com Communist Party of Nepal to oppose Nepali Congress policies. But Shaha was also accused of being pro-absolute Q. Do you support US military aid to Nepal? Thereafter, he left for New York to set up Nepal’s permanent mission to New York in monarchy for asking the king to step since he believed 1956, and also served as the country’s first ambassador to the US. It is a measure of his the politicians were ruining the country. stature in the world body that in 1961, he was appointed chairman of the international But he was above all a humanist, and a keen analyst of commission to investigate the death of Dag Hammarskjøld, the UN secretary-general who the Nepal’s political evolution. Writing in 1996, a couple of died in a plane crash in the Congo. months after the “people’s war” began, Shaha said: “The Shaha was brought back to Nepal in 1960 after King Mahendra’s takeover to serve as signs of an imminent legitimacy crisis are already visible in MIN BAJRACHARYA a cabinet minister. For the next couple of years, he was shunted around as Foreign Nepal’s fledgling democracy, and the immateriality Minister, special ambassador to the UN and as chairman of the commission to draft the accorded to the civilian deaths in Rolpa is a foretaste of Panchayat constitution. Having won a Rastriya Panchayat seat from the graduates’ difficult days ahead.” Only a statesman with vision can constituency in 1967, his statement calling for a more representative and a more foresee events so far into the future. ! 222 EDITORIAL 15 - 21 NOVEMBER 2002 NEPALI TIMES NATION 15 - 21 NOVEMBER 2002 NEPALI TIMES 333 Nepali Times is published by Himalmedia Pvt Ltd, STATE OF THE STATE by CK LAL COMMENT by HITMAN THAPA Chief Editor: Kunda Dixit Editor: Anagha Neelakantan Design: Kiran Maharjan [email protected], www.nepalitimes.com Advertising: Sunaina Shah [email protected] Subscription: Anil Karki [email protected] Sales: Sudan Bista [email protected] Sanchaya Kosh Building, Block A-4th Floor, Lalitpur GPO Box 7251, Kathmandu, Nepal Tel: 01-543333-7, Fax: 01-521013 The economics Printed at Jagadamba Press: 01-521393 How to talk of democratic decay he United Nations representative in There are uncanny parallels between the conflict in El Salvador and that in REACTION AND REVOLUTION Nepal has said that the UN would T be willing to act as a mediator if Nepal.