UN officials seek authorization for new Nepal mission

Reuter reports UN officials seek Security Council authorization on Thursday for a new mission in Nepal that includes 186 military monitors to help enforce a peace pact between the government and Maoist rebels.

The council last month approved an advance group of 35 monitors in response to formal requests from both sides that the United Nations intervene immediately to monitor disarmament of the rebels and make sure the army stays in their barracks.

The Nepalese clamored for United Nations intervention, according to Ian Martin, the special UN representative for Nepal. “Seventy percent of the population wanted a UN role in the peace process and it gives us real leverage with both sides,” he said.

The new UN operation, which the Security Council is being asked to approve, is called the UN Mission in Nepal and is to be established for a year at the outset. One task of the human rights monitors is to promote a criminal justice system that is accessible to all, including the Dalits, women, survivors of sexual violence and the rural poor, according to a report from Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon prepared for the council.

Nepali Maoists avenge Belgian minister

The Belgian government about five years ago sold sophisticated firearms to the Royal Nepalese Army. By then Nepal's Maoist guerrillas were fighting with the Nepali Army. Now a Belgian minister was taxed by the insurgents while visiting Nepal on a trekking holiday.

Nepal's official media said Vincent Quikenborne, Belgium's general administration minister, was forced to pay an unspecified amount as tourist tax to the communist rebels on his trip to western Nepal in Myagdi district.

The minister told the state-run Rastriya Samachar Samiti (RSS) news agency such Maoist action, after a peace pact with the government and agreeing to stop extortion, was not good for Nepal's image.

According to the local media, NRS 100 is being imposed as "tourist tax" daily by a regional rebel organization, the self-styled Tamuwan Autonomous People's Republic, in western Kaski district.

Tourists heading for treks and climbs in the well-known Annapurna mountain range area have no option but to pay up.

A German trekker, D. Bradler, said he had paid NRS 800 for an eight-day trip and had been issued a "receipt" by the rebels.

A group of five Koreans paid NRS 45,000, the state media said. Asked about the "tax", a Maoist leader said the party had decided to levy it as long as the Maoists were not included in the government. However, from Monday the rebels will be in the government and hopefully such tax will not exist.