Tripartite agreement near consensus, Martin leaves for NY

The joint team discussion among the government, the Maoists and the United Nations representatives for the purpose of reaching tripartite agreement, on Saturday, ended inconclusively.

The members of the joint team spent over seven hours discussing the detailed modality for arms and army management at Summit hotel in Lalitpur today.

After the meeting ended at around 7:30 pm , the government and the Maoist talk teams members told journalists that they only had a few issues that remained unsettled. They said remaining issues in the 16-page long tripartite agreement would be finalized and signed on Sunday.

The meeting has intensively discussed the modalities of arms and army management, number of weapons required by the People's Liberation Army for security of the camps, establishment of 21 associate camps nearby the main camps and so on.

It is learnt that a commission has been proposed to monitor the arms of PLA and Nepali Army and the UN would be given the role of observer only.

The three sides have been attempting to finalize the tripartite agreement after personal representative of the UN secretary general to Nepal Ian Martin suggested adopting the interim constitution only after the finalization of tripartite agreement for arms and army management.

Meanwhile, Martin left for New York on Saturday evening to present the report of progress on Nepal's peace process to the UN secretary general Kofi Annan. After approval by the Security Council, the UN expert team is expected to start its work from next week. nepalnews.com ia Nov 25 06