There is progress in Nepal toward implementing a 2006 peace agreement ending its civil war though the Constituent Assembly working to do so is set to expire May 28, a senior State Department official said.
“I don’t think anybody believes they’re going to meet that deadline, but they have made some important progress,” Robert Blake, assistant secretary of State, Bureau of South and Central Asian Affairs, said at a May 24 Defense Writers Group breakfast.
One of the key issues is how to integrate the former Maoist combatants into the Nepalese army, Blake said. “There has been some recent progress in that regard where the Nepalese army has floated some ideas for including between 6,000 and 10,000 of the former Maoist combatants into various units of the armed forces and into the Forestry Service and things like that. The Maoists have in principle accepted those offers.”
However, depending on who’s counting, Blake said, that’s only about half of the combatant Maoist force. “Obviously, there’s going to have to be a reintegration program of some sort with them as well.”
Some 20,000 former guerrillas live in nearly 30 camps around the country, AllHeadlineNews reported yesterday. The 1996-2006 civil war left some 13,000 dead, thousands more unaccounted for and massive disruption, reports said.
Additional problems arose May 26, as Maoists refused to surrender their weapons, locked in steel containers in the camps. Also, strikes have swept the country and there is unrest near the border with India, published reports said.
With an annual defense budget hovering around $60 million with military assistance from China and the United States. Nepal has received equipment such as M-16s and night vision from the United States since 9/11.
A second looming issue on the agenda is rewriting the constitution, Blake said. “There hasn’t really been very much or sufficient progress yet. Almost everybody expects that the parties will extend, give themselves more time, between six and 12 months most likely, so we expect that decision in the next several days.”
The United States contributed some technical assistance on the drafting of the constitution, and the ambassador, Scott DeLisi, a career member of the Senior Foreign Service and Blake are encouraging the parties to work together and help to bridge some of the differences.
Blake said one of the issues here is how to better integrate the south into the “rhythm” of the country and give that area more rights.
“There’s a whole separate movement called the Madhesi movement, about how to, again, give them greater rights,” he said. “It’s one of the poorest parts of the country. It’s also an area where there’s a lot of banditry and potentially an area where terrorists could organize. It’s on the Indian border too, so that’s of additional concern.”
Nepal sits between China and India.