His Majesty opens Kid’s Guernica art exhibition

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KATHMANDU, Dec 25 - His Majesty King Birendra Bir Bikram Shah Dev today inaugurated the exhibition of Kid’s Guernica-2000 by flying a pair of white pigeons. The pigeons supposedly disseminate the message of peace from children around the world.

About 53 huge paintings on canvas, made by 10,000 children from 19 countries around the world during the period of five years, are on display in the open ground of Tundhikhel. Seven of the paintings were created by Nepali children during November and December. Each was the result of the work of a group of 625 children.

Art Japan Network initiated Kid’s Guernica workshop in 1995 by inviting children of every country to express their message for peace.

The paintings are inspired by Pablo Picasso’s famous 1937 painting of a small Spanish town, shattered by the Spanish Civil War. "Guernica," the Picasso work, is considered the most powerful art work against war.

Special Court to try Maoists set up amid controversies

By Pramod Poudel

KATHMANDU, Dec 25 - Finally the government has established a special court to look into the cases of crimes against the state, mainly to try Maoists, but not without controversy. The government is expected to seek strong legal action against the Maoist activists in the court.

The Nepal Gazette published on Monday says, "The Court has been established under the provision - Article 3 and 4 of the Special Court Act - 1974. Judge Mohan Prasad Sitaula, of Rajbiraj Appellate Court, has been appointed as the Chairman while Judge Gyanendra Bahadur Karki of Ilam Appellate Court and Judge Jagannath Pathak of Pokhara Appellate Court, have been selected as its members."

According to the Gazette, the Special Court will look into cases of crimes against the State, drugs, foreign exchange transactions and women trafficking. "The court to be based in Kathmandu, can set up its benches anywhere in the nation," states the Gazette.

A senior government official admitted that the Special Court has been formed especially to look after cases against those arrested on suspicion of their involvement in the People’s War waged by the Nepal Communist Party (Maoist) for the last five years.

The speciality of this court is that, it can file cases, investigate and seek evidences on its own. "Police can only make arrests, but they are not authorised to take statement from those arrested, without the presence of the representative of the Special Court," said the Official.

Some of the lawyers have challenged the legality of the formation of the Special Court, especially against the background that a case is pending in the Supreme Court seeking annulment of the Special Court Act. A writ petition was filed at the Supreme Court by Jyoti Baniya a wek ago claiming that the Act contradicts with the Constitution.

"Since the Supreme Court has already issued a show cause notice last Tuesday in response to the writ petition seeking the cancellation of the Special Court Act, such court can not be formed now as the case is sub-judice," said Senior Advocate and former Attorney General Sarbagya Ratna Tuladhar. "What will happen if the Supreme Court issues an order against the establishment of such a Special Court ?".

Tuladhar even questioned the rationale behind the formation of the Special Court. "Cases related to the Maoist issue can easily be handled by the regular courts. Government should declare that the regular courts are incapable of handling cases related to Maoist issues, if it is the case," Tuladhar said, adding, " Otherwise, there is a ground to suspect government’s motives."

Udaya Nepali Shrestha, Secretary at the Ministry of Law, Justice and Parliamentary Affairs, said that he had no knowledge of the show cause notice issued by the Supreme Court. Shrestha emphasized that the government did not violate any article of the Constitution while establishing the court.

Bastola, Thinley confident of ‘breakthrough’

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The tenth Nepal-Bhutan ministerial level talks on the Bhutanese refugee issue in progress at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Shital Niwas, in Kathmandu on Monday.

KATHMANDU, Dec 25 - The day one of the three-day tenth round of Nepal-Bhutan talks on the repatriation of Bhutanese refugees was devoted to confidence building measures and ended on an optimistic note on Monday.

Both the foreign ministers - Nepal’s Chakra Prasad Bastola and Bhutan’s Jigme Y Thinley - said that the talks were conducted in a positive atmosphere. They reiterated their confidence about the breakthrough during the discussion this time around on the repatriation issue.

"That we will have agreed at the end of it," said Thinley, referring to the start of the verification process while talking to the press after the end of the first day of the talks today. He termed the verification as the very objective and the goal of the current Joint Ministerial Level Committee (JMLC) talks.

Despite both sides agreeing to begin the verification process in the eighth round itself in September 1999, no breakthrough has been achieved so far on the vexed issue.

Thinley hinted that Bhutan could agree to accept the documents possessed by the refugees as the basis for the verification. "That is what we will have agreed at the end of it," he said. However, he denied that the basic focus of the talks was on the documents. "No, no, the document is only just an expression of the substance that we will have agreed upon and that substance is what is under discussion."

The Bhutanese foreign minister exuded the confidence for the breakthrough after many more sessions of the current talks. "We will get to where we want to."

His counterpart Bastola said that he had tried to build trust during the talks. "I asked them to shed their suspicion and suggested that we be honest in our line of thought." Bhutan’s suspicion, Bastola said, was that Nepal would export population to Bhutan, "which is not our intention anyway".

Bastola further said that he had offered to remove any suspicion that Bhutan had and that Nepal was ready to give clarification on the subject.

Earlier, a touch of disappointment was perceptible in Bastola’s voice, when he started talking to the press after the talks today. Speaking about the Bhutanese delegation, he said: "They are so nice, but the result never comes." Indeed, nine previous rounds have failed to resolve the refugee repatriation imbroglio.

Bastola added that he was very hopeful of the result this time around. "If we didn’t have hopes, we don’t go for round and round of talks. I hope this is not a round talk, but a straight talk."

He, however, declined to comment on the substance of today’s talks referred to by his counterpart Thinley earlier.

PM sighs relief as rebels stall no-trust motion

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KATHMANDU, Dec 25 - At least for now Prime Minister Girija Prasad Koirala can breathe a sigh of relief. The rebels who said they were filing a no-trust motion against Koirala are having difficulties trusting themselves.

The anti-Koirala camp of the ruling Nepali Congress (NC) which claims to have enough lawmakers on its side to file a no-confidence motion against Koirala did not file it today as expected.

Instead, the members of the rival-lot are yet to agree on whether to file the proposal immediately or wait to garner more support on its side.

According to a leader of the rebel camp, some of the members including Purna Bahadur Khadka and Bal Bahadur KC are reportedly in favour of filing of the proposal immediately, whereas others like Khum Bahadur Khadka, Koirala’s aide-turned-foe want to wait for more support.

Khadka who helped Koirala depose Krishna Prasad Bhattarai from power in March, later shifted his camp and led anti-Koirala signature campaign in August demanding that Koirala let go either the party presidency or the premiership.

Lately, there have been growing scepticism about Khadka’s support to any of the two contestants for the party’s presidency, as his support is deemed crucial to win the positions in the party.

Khadka left for Pokhara, where NC’s tenth convention is taking place, on Sunday, stating that he needs time to think about the no-trust motion. It is reported that he has given words to both Deuba and Koirala for his support in the elections.

The rebel camp is meeting on Tuesday to discuss on its strategies for the motion and upcoming elections in Pokhara, said sources close to the Deuba camp.

Prime Minister Koirala last week announced that the party’s constitution would be amended in order to bring collective leadership to the party instead of the present presidential system.

Nationalities call for constitutional amendment

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KATHMANDU, Dec 25 - The present Constitution has largely neglected the problems of the aboriginal-nationalities and Dalit (oppressed communities) and has given continuity to the past legacy of discrimination, said activists here today.

They argued that such gross discriminations have compelled the communities to lead a life of poverty, ignorance and uncertainty.

"There are altogether 26 discriminatory provisions in the Constitution of the Kingdom of Nepal, 1999 which contradicts the interest of nationalities, the Dalits and the tribes of the country," said Dr Krishna Bahadur Bhattachan, a sociologist and rights activists.

Including the preamble of the Constitution, Articles 2, 4, 6 (1,2), 7 (2), 9 (1, 2, 4-a, 5), 11 (3), 12 (1, 2-a, b, c), 17, 18 (2), 19, 26 (2, 10), 46, 112, 113 (2-d), 114, 116 are discriminatory against the aboriginal-nationalities, Bhattachan said.

Bhattachan was speaking at a press conference organised by Nepal National Federation of Nationalities (NEFAN) here today.

Bhattachan also informed that a recent meeting, attended by 39 organisations of ethnic groups and oppressed classes, has demanded that, "¼reservations should be made on the basis of population proportion at all decisive levels of governing organs."

Instead of promoting the languages of the nationalities as envisaged by the Constitution, the successive governments in the post-1990 period have made Sanskrit compulsory in the school curriculum, said Til Bikram Nemwang, a member of Royal Nepal Academy.

"The best way to impart education to the children is through their mother tongue," said Nemwang. He also alleged that by playing with words, Nepal was declared as a Hindu Kingdom, "which gave rise to many complexities".

"The main reason behind the backwardness of the Dalits and ethnic groups is the absence of schooling in their own mother tongue," said Bal Krishna Mabuhang, General Secretary of the Federation.

On the occasion Bhattachan said that the Federation was basically seeking the rights to self-determination of the nationalities through Constitutional amendments and said "we have shown our goodwill for the last three centuries and we can no longer remain like this".

Tension lingers in Biratnagar, Butwal

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KATHMANDU, Dec 25 - Public vehicles stayed off roads after a group of Maoist-aligned students hurled stones at a bus and shattered its wind-screens in Biratnagar, Monday morning.

The bus operators, however, resumed services after riot-police were mobilised to ensure security.

A bus employee was hurt in the incident. The riot-police still remain deployed in the downtown area following last week’s threat to start armed struggle by the Maoist-affiliated students, police said.

The industrial city had remained tense for a week following clashes between students, bus operators and riot-police over a skirmish between the bus operators and students. More than 60 students and 40 policemen were injured during the weeklong clashes.

Meanwhile, a fresh report from Butwal states that, the city has once become tense after a tractor hit two school students Monday.

According to Regional Traffic Unit, two students on bicycles, Keshav Gurung, 19, and Yam Bahadur Gurung, 17, from Jogikuti, were hit by the tractor (Lu 1 Ta 4074) at Jogikuti, about four kilometers south of here. Injured Keshav was rushed to Kathmandu and Yam Bahadur was undergoing treatment at the Lumbini Zonal Hospital in Butwal.

At least a thousand students took to the street on their own and forcibly closed down all city schools, public vehicles and market to protest against the accident. The angry crowd also vandalised the office of the Butwal-based Labour Welfare Fund and a police beat office.

The agitated students also pelted stones at some of the private vehicles plying on the road. They demanded an immediate cancellation of the provision of Rs 17,000, given as compensation to the bereaved family following the death of a person in a road accident.

Butwal had limped back to normalcy after peaceful resolution of Thursday’s incident. Two students and a bus owner were killed on Thursday’s separate incidents, which invited the closure of the bazaar for two consecutive days. A truce was reached between the administration and bus operators to resolve the agitation.

Christmas heralds festivity and more fun in capital

By Utpal Raj Misra

MERRY X-MAS : A staff at Neerulas' Restaurant in the capital's Durbar Marg decorating an x-mas tree on Sunday.

KATHMANDU, Dec 25 More than two thousand years after the census night at Bethlehem, the Christians the world over once again celebrated the birth of Christ, for the first time this Millennium, today.

In Kathmandu too, Christmas was celebrated. Unlike the yesteryears when nothing noticeable, apart from the Christmas parties at different hotels would mark the day, today people could be seen neatly dressed heading towards their respective churches in a festive mood.

At the Assumption Church, Dhobighat, the largest Roman-Catholic church in Kathmandu, children were seen performing short nativity plays and singing Christmas carols in the morning after the celebration and Christmas Eve Mid-night communion. Fr Silas Bogati said that the church was celebrating Mass - a ceremony held in memory of the last meal that Christ had with his disciples - in two other hotels as well.

In the other churches, including the Protestant churches of the capital, congregation singing Christmas carols could be observed.

Christmas celebrations this year involved more ‘heathens’ participation as well, not in religious ceremonies, but in fabulous partying.

Feroz Pradhan, proprietor of a restaurant and bar in downtown Thamel, said, "Yesterday, around eighty per cent of the people who came here to celebrate Christmas Eve were non-Christian Nepalis. No matter what the occasion is Nepalis are always in the mood to celebrate. For them Christmas is just another reason to celebrate, they just want to drink and have fun."

Looking at the sharp drop in number of tourists this year, hoteliers say they did not arrange for any extravaganza like they did last year.

"However, the turnout was more than expected, as the gap was filled by locals, mainly youths," said Sangeeta Rana, Guest Service Manager of Hotel Yak and Yeti. The Nepali youths take western festivals more as a fashion. "Year after year more young Nepalis are attending these kinds of celebrations," she added.

Not only for youths seeking fun-time outing, this Christmas also mattered for businessmen as well. Owner of a apparel store located at Durbar Marg said that, he decorated his shop with Christmas message and a Tree to attract more clients and it worked. "Our customers are generally the expatriate community and decorating the store helped to some extent in attracting them," he said.

The tourists walking along the roads of the capital had mixed ideas about Christmas Celebrations in Kathmandu.

"We had Nepali food, very much different from what we are used to having during the Christmas, there were Nepali songs and the people were very nice," said an American national. "I enjoyed it very much, probably this is the best Christmas of my life," he added.

"It was different!" exclaimed a Swiss couple. "Although religious aspect is involved in the celebrations, more people in the West are attracted by presents and parties. The religious ceremonies are drab to them. In that sense, we really enjoyed Christmas this year, no church bells, no religious ceremonies. It was different, and nice," they said.

"I miss home and family, this year Christmas has been different but not any better," lamented a woman from Holland.

Hollowness of Govt’s claims revealed in Kalikot health posts

Gunaraj/Harihar/Kashi

KALIKOT, Dec 25 - People in this remote hill district of the country have a "district" level hospital that is no more than a primary health centre. Predictably, condition of the patients suffering from various diseases is pathetic to say the least.

Although all the 30 Village Development Committees (VDCs) of Kalikot, situated in the inaccessible Karnali Zone in the Mid-western region, boast of government health units that are hardly able to provide any health services to the inhabitants here. The hollowness of the government’s claim of spreading health network in all the VDCs of the country is borne out by the fact that the villagers have to trudge the steep slopes of the mountains even for simple drugs.

The tale of woe of the 40-year old Padma Mahatara, a tuberculosis (TB) patient from Mugraha village, which lies a day’s walking distance from the district headquarters, Manma Khandachakra, is common in this part of the Kingdom. Mahatara had to go to the regional headquarters Surkhet for treatment after the district hospital failed to diagnose her disease.

"I went for check-up in Mugraha once but my ailment could not be diagnosed," Mahatara, carrying a milk-suckling child in her arms, tells The Kathmandu Post on board a private-sector helicopter that charged her more than a couple of thousand rupees. She came to know of her disease in the Surkhet hospital. "Since the treatment (for TB) is available in the district itself, I am returning there."

The district hospital, an hour’s walk from Khandachakra, is itself ‘TB-affected’. Bhim Prasad Pandey, a peon at the hospital is a TB patient who contracted the dreaded disease probably from the TB patients who flock to the hospital. After diagnosing his disease in Lucknow, the capital city of the northern Indian state of Uttar Pradesh, Pandey has started taking medicine as per the DOTS (Directly Observed Treatment - Short Course) method.

The patients coming for the TB medicines are many. Of late, this number has dwindled due to blasting of two bridges at Rengilghat and Lalighat by the Maoists recently.

But those belonging to well-to-do families either go to Surkhet, the regional headquarters, or other places for treatment. "If you cannot pay, there will be no other option but to die," says Vice President of the District Development Committee (DDC) Tularaj Bista. "There is no health facility here."

Kalikot was declared as a separate district in 1978. But the district still does not have a district health post. Impoverished people here have been forced to do away with a primary health centre which fortunately has a doctor--Dr Sundar Shyam Jha--at present.

Dr Jha is also the in-charge of the District Public Health Office. He has completed his 16 months of service here although officially he was supposed to work only for 233 days as per the government’s health policy.

His presence here has created history in a way as none of the doctors who were assigned here in the past completed their full assignment period. Similar is the story of non-medical staff both at the district health post and elsewhere in the far-flung villages.

Jail inmates having field day in Dunai

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DOLPA, Dunai, Dec 25 - Inmates of the District Prison, Dunai are having field day these days. They do not have to spend their time inside tall walls of the prison but sleep in their cosy bedrooms in their houses. This is because prison walls no longer exist in Dunai jail.

Maoist rebels destroyed the district jail and other administrative offices during their attack on September 25. The destroyed jail has not been properly renovated.

Jailor Ganga Mani Sharma says that lack of prison cell space has forced the authorities to allow 10 prisoners to stay-on at home on the condition that they present themselves at the district administration office every day. However, a prisoner, Lakpa Chhiring Dhokpa, from Solukhumbu, a theft accused, was transferred to Nepalgunj, Wednesday.

Nineteen prisoners were lodged in the jail before the rebels raided and torched all documents before letting them free. Except for the four who absconded, the rest of the prisoners returned to the jail later.

Owing to their good conduct, four of the prisoners were released from detention on Constitution Day on November 8, waiving-off their remaining sentences.

The prisoners could not be shifted to other districts as they were facing charges in the local district court, Jailor Sharma said. He also added that, it would take six months to reconstruct the jail after the budget for reconstruction is released. The budget is as yet to be released.

The rebels killed 14 policemen, abducted 12 jail guards and looted over 50 million Rupees during the September raid.

Kanti Children’s hospital justifies service charge hike

By Pragya Ghimire

KATHMANDU, Dec 25 - Despite directives from the Ministry of Health to roll-back the service charge hike to authorities at Kanti Children’s Hospital, the hospital management is unlikely to decide in that direction.

Though the hospital management formed a committee to look into the possibilities to roll back the price, even after several rounds of meetings the committee is yet to reach any conclusions.

Hospital sources say the committee is unlikely to reverse the management’s decision to raise the prices by up to 2400 per cent in some of its services.

To put it in the words of director at the hospital Dr Govinda Ojha, the price hike was "inevitable" and "is fully justified for the simple reason that the hospital needs to sustain itself and the charges have remained unchanged since the past five years."

The committee set up to review the hike has not exactly been functional reducing any chances of changes in the new charges.

Some of the doctors at the country’s only paediatric hospital say that increased service charge has hit thousands of parents who reach to the hospital looking for affordable service to their ailing children.

Yagya Ghimire of Sankhuwasabha, whose daughter is undergoing treatment at the hospital, complains that the amount he drew as loan is not sufficient for his daughter’s treatment and he cannot afford it.

Hem Nath Dharel from Dhading says, "I took loan from Rastriya Banijya Bank for my son’s treatment and sold five of my goats. And if my son still does not get cured I will have no other way."

Though the service charge has been increased, the staff at the hospital have not been able to get any increase in the benefits they have been getting. The employees who used to get Rs 30 per day for the 24 hours duty they did has also been cut down, they say.

The employees at the hospital warn that if the government does not pay them according to the time they devote and service they render they will be compelled to take steps to hold general strike.

"It is the duty of government to pay us for our service otherwise we will be forced to stop the services and start protest programmes," says a staff at the hospital.

The Hospital Development Committee on September 7 had decided to increase charges for various services but Dr Ojha said that the hospital is still facing financial crisis, "the change has only helped to compensate some financial burden".