Fourth Indian trade fair begins today

BY A STAFF REPORTER

Kathmandu, Sept. 18: The fourth Indian Trade Exhibition (ITE) is to kick off at Bhrikuti Mandap on Tuesday.

Organised by India Trade Promotion Organisation, the six-day (Sept. 19-24) fair will showcase innovative and quality products, services and technologies matching global standards, the organisers said today. The third exhibition was held in 1997, second in 1988 and the first in 1985.

"Agro-based products, bio-technology, non-conventional energy, information technology and pharmaceuticals will constitute the main part of the exhibition," Exhibition Director Vijay Kumar told a press conference here this afternoon.

Pollution control equipment, automobiles, electric goods, chemicals and allied products, cement and building materials, domestic appliances and garments will be other products on show.

Kumar said that the exhibition to be participated in by nearly 100 Indian companies was expected to have a transaction of 1,600 million rupees.

"We are looking forward to have about 30-40 more joint venture as agreements as well as agency agreements during the exhibition," Kumar said. There are about 180 Nepal-India joint ventures in operation in Nepal at present and the total Indian investment is over 22 billion rupees.

The other attractions of the exhibition will be a seminar on New Vistas of Economic Co-operation between Nepal and India, cultural programmes and fashion shows.

The exhibition is organised in association with the Indian Embassy with the Cupertino of Nepal India Chamber of Commerce and Industry and support of the Federation of Nepalese Chambers of Commerce and Industry.

It’s immoral to use children for violent acts: Bastola

Kathmandu, Sept. 18 (RSS): Foreign Minister Chakra Prasad Bastola has said," it is immoral to use children as victims or perpetrators of violence and it is, therefore, our fundamental obligation to protect them and give them the opportunity to bloom into full human being."

Addressing an international conference on "war affected children" held at Winnipeg, Canada from September 16-17, the Foreign Minister said, "the welfare of children should take precedence over every thing else both in war and in peace."

Describing children as "our inspiration, our strength and our future," he said, "protecting them is to protect our common future on our shared planet."

Stressing the need to help children already affected by war and make sure that they are kept off limit in warlike situations, he said, "we must prevent war and conflict from happening."

Therefore, our energies and resources must be applied to preventing war and conflict, rather than waiting to deal with their consequences, he added.

"Nepal is one of the first few countries that signed and ratified the child convention. We have also signed its two protocols during the millennium summit," he noted, saying "a child development action plan has been formulated, and the national human rights commission constituted. We are working on a national plan for the promotion of human rights as well."

"Nepal has had the enabling domestic legislation in place to implement the provisions of the country’s constitution as well as the child convention. Children, for instance, are provided with free education, protection from child labour, right to their person and property as minors," he pointed out.

They have access to free inoculation and primary health care. Minors involved in crimes are treated leniently, he added.

"We have set the minimum recruitment age for the military at sixteen, but young soldiers are not sent to combat duties until the age of 18. In police also, similar provisions apply," he said.

"However, we are a least developed and landlocked country where poverty is part of life. In a situation of extreme poverty, people die of hunger and diseases. Children have to work at home or in the field, as they provide extra hand for the family in the daily drudgery for survival," minister Bastola said.

"The Maoists," he said, "have been recruiting children and using them to perpetrate violence in their heinous design to destabilise other a peaceful society."

"It is imperative to reduce poverty to remove the root cause of conflict. Efforts must also be made to promote human rights, democracy and good governance, as they ensure greater stability in society and accountability in polity," he further said.

"Children who are affected by war must be given the opportunity and help to overcome the trauma, the disabilities they sustain, and the care they need to grow and excel," he suggested, calling for greater international co-operation to achieve these objectives.

Various measures decided to rehabilitate Kamaiyas

Kathmandu, Sept. 18 (RSS): The Kamaiyas identification and rehabilitation central coordination and monitoring committee that met here today under the chairmanship of the Committee chairman and Deputy Prime Minister Ramchandra Paudel approved the recommendations made in the reports prepared after the inspection visits to Dang, Banke, Bardiya, Kailali and Kanchanpur, the districts where the Kamaiyas or bonded labourers are concentrated in.

The reports were presented at the meeting by member-secretary of the committee Yoddha Shaha.

The meeting decided to recommend to His Majesty’s Government to extend the term of the central and district level coordination and monitoring committees formed to work on the identification and rehabilitation of the Kamaiyas till April 13, 2001 and rename the district level committee as freed Kamaiyas identification and rehabilitation district committee. The terms of the existing central and districts committees expires on Sept. 25.

The meeting also decided to launch an emergency food assistance programme for the Kamaiyas in Kailali and Kanchanpur, and assign a joint team of one government officer and one accountant to distribute the relief materials (foodstuff) in a planned and transparent manner under the direct observation of the district rehabilitation committee.

As decided at the meeting, the committee will recommend to the government to include representatives of Nepal Red Cross Society, INGOs, and NGO Federation in the central and district level committees, immediately start distributing identification cards to the homeless Kamaiyas and establish a regional office with an gazetted first class officer as project chief in Nepalgunj to coordinate and implement the Kamaiya skill development and rehabilitation programme in a planned manner.

It also decided to instruct the district committee to identify and do the mapping of the illegally usurped government/public land and bring such land under government control with the help of the local administration, and activate the landless settlers problems resolution commission so as to distribute such land to the homeless Kamaiyas.

The meeting also decided to instruct the Kailali district development committee to do the mapping of the government land in geta VDC Kailali and Dhangadhi municipality ward no. 11 without any delay and distribute such land to the homeless Kamaiyas.

The meeting was attended by Minister for Land Reforms and Management Siddha Raj Ojha and Minister of State Gopal Rai, Minister of State for Women, Children and Social Welfare Mrs Kamala Pant, member of National Planning Commission Harishankar Tripathi, the secretaries at the Ministry of Land Reforms and Management and the Ministry of Physical Planning and Works, and other seniors officers of other ministries.

Give due importance to small industries: DPM

Kathmandu, Sept. 18 (RSS): Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Local Development Ram Chandra Poudel has stressed the need for establishment of industries and maximum utilisation of forest and water resources for long-term economic development.

Addressing a seminar on the small and medium scale industries organised here today by Nepal Chamber of Commerce and the Centre for Development and Governance, Deputy Prime Minister Poudel urged the industrialists and the businessmen to give up a tendency to become rich overnight and pay attention to the development of small and traditional industries.

He expressed the view that appropriate use of industrial raw materials and investment capital available in the country would help the poverty alleviation drive in a big way.

It is a weakness on our part that vast natural resources of the country remain still not properly utilised, the Deputy Prime Minister said, laying stress on manpower mobilisation in researches on the development potentials and appropriate technology requirement of the country.

Minister of State for Local Development Suresh Malla also stressed that the entrepreneurs should make investment on the basis of regional priority since the concentration of development activities at the centre would not help strike a regional balance.

SAARC Secretary-General Nihal Rodrigo said that the benefits of the environment of market economy, openness and economic liberalization could be taken through development of small and medium scale industries as well.

Industrialists and businessmen Padma Jyoti, Rabi Bhakta Shrestha, Rajesh Kaji Shrestha, Jagdish Prasad Khetan and Vishwa Keshar Maskey urged His Majesty’s Government to formulate acts and regulations conducive to the development of the small and cottage industries and to adopt policy that would encourage such industries for the economic development of the country and poverty alleviation.

Participants of the one-day seminar reiterated the important role played by the small and medium industries in reducing unemployment and increasing the gross domestic product (GDP).

They pointed out that the government should develop small and medium scale industries as the back-bone of the national economy.

The industrialists and businessmen complained that small and medium industries were in bad shape due to traditional management, limited investment, lack of technological innovation and modernization in marketing and management practices and the lack of coordination between the government’s local and central industrial organisations.

‘Maoists’ path contravenes Marxist ideology’

Butwal, Sept. 18 (RSS): CPN-UML acting general secretary Bharat Mohan Adhikari inaugurated the 15th national conference of All Nepal National Free Students Union (ANNFSU) here today.

Some 800 ANNFSU students from across the country and representatives from 14 countries including India, Bhutan, Pakistan, Africa, Korea, Australia and China are taking part in the week-long conference.

popular and sensitive activities is the need of the day.

He said that the Maoist movement is not in accordance with the ideology of Marxist and Leninist.

CPN-UML standing committee member Modnath Prashrit pointed out the need for building an independent and populist society.

CPN-UML central member and All Nepal Women’s Association president Vidhya Devi Bhandari expressed the view that serious attention should be given towards the discouraging situation which has arisen following the privatisation and commercialisation of education.

CPN-UML central members Shanker Pokharel and Bhim Acharya, MP Pashupati Chaulagain and other speakers also expressed their views at the function chaired by ANNFSU president Hikmat Karki.

On the occasion Bharat Mohan Adhikari also presented the Manmohan Adhikari Memorial Award to the three toppers of school leaving certificate examinations Sumnima Singh, Jeevan Poudel and Manoj Bohara. The award carries a cash prize of Rs. 2000 each and certificates.

AIDS death toll reaches 17 in Makawanpur

Hetauda, Sept. 18 (RSS): The death toll of Acquired Immuno-Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS) has reached 17 so far in Makawanpur district, according to the district AIDS co-ordination office.

Seventy people in all are reported suffering from AIDS in some VDCs and Hetauda Town in Makawanpur, most of whom are either drug addicts or women who returned home from Bombay brothels.

In Hetauda, the number of unemployed youth taking hemp and hashish and hard drugs like heroin is increasing at present, and their present number is put at 115, according to the district police office.

Some of them were arrested for indulging in drug trafficking across the Nepal-India border, but no specific punishment has been awarded them for lack of appropriate legal provision. Besides, it has been very difficult to save the life of those addicts, according to the criminal investigation branch inspector Govinda Bahadur Khadka.

About fifty-five of the addicts have sued for indulging in illegal activities, according to the record available at the office

According to police Superintendent Narendra Kumar Khaling, it has stepped up measures to track down and arrest groups of persons indulging in girl trafficking or taking girls to India under the pretext of providing with good jobs.

The district AIDS co-ordination branch chief Jhabindra Bhandari says AIDS awareness, detection and control programme has been launched in all those VDCs and Hetaudra Town.

Discount on essential commodities on Bada Dashain

Gorkha, Sept. 18 (RSS): An all-party meeting convened by Chief District Officer Atma Ram Pandey of Gorkha district at the district administration office here has announced 5 to 20 per cent discount on essential commodities and Rs. 5 discount per kilogramme of mutton on the occasion of the Bada Dashain festival.

The meeting decided that the district administration would coordinate and co-operate with the Gorkha District Chamber of Commerce and Industry so that there will not be an artificial shortage of essential commodities and consumer goods in the local market during the Dashain festival.

In this connection, the meeting agreed to distribute the grain in stock at the Sirdibas and Machhikhola depots in the northern parts of the district to the local people proportionately on the basis of the population density of the area.

Similarly, the meeting agreed to set up a fair price Dashain Bazaar and an agricultural market at ward No. 2, Naya Bazaar of Prithivi Narayan Municipality for the convenience of the consumers and the general public.

It was also agreed at the meeting that the municipality would clean up the market and regulate the traffic and wrongly parked vehicles along the road.

‘Nourish Nepal-China relations’

BY A STAFF REPORTER

Kathmandu, Sept. 18: Foreign relations experts, scholars and historians from both Nepal and China today emphasized the need to further strengthen the relations between two nations at people-to-people level.

The age old ties between two neighbours should be further widened to expedite developmental activities and common goal of economic uplift of people, they said.

Dwelling upon Nepal-China relations, scholars put forth their views to find new avenues of friendly relations in the changed context of the new millennium.

Addressing the seminar on "Nepal-China Relations," organised by China Study Center here Rajsabha Standing Committee chairman Dr. Keshar Jung Rayamajhi noted that relations with China should be given importance and scholars from both the nations should strive to develop relations at the level of people.

Since Nepal is a birthplace of Buddha, Buddhism has become another factor to strengthen ties between Nepal and China. As the foreign policy of both the nations is based on peaceful co-existence and the principle of Panchasheela, both of us are peace loving nations. Hence our commitment to peace and development makes up more close to each other, he said and pointed out the need to learn from China.

Appreciating the contributions of China in the developmental activities of Nepal, he noted China since the beginning of its diplomatic relations with Nepal has been assisting in various areas.

Former Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba, while speaking at the function admitted that no problems has yet cropped up between two nations.

Deuba also hailed the contribution of China in the development activities of Nepal. Pointing out the need to share experience of China, he said Nepal should learn development efforts from China. He also noted the possibility of transportation of goods to Humla, Bajhang via Tibet-the autonomous region of China.

Chinese Ambassador to the Kingdom of Nepal Zeng Xuyong noted that Nepal and China have always understood, supported each other and carried out sincere cooperation and the Nepal-China friendship has taken roots in the hearts of people of two countries.

He said "Our relations have stood up to the test of changing international situation and become a model of good-neighbourly friendship."

The facts proved that Nepal-China friendship not only conforms with the fundamental interest of the poeple of two nations, but also conduces to peace and stability in the region. Ambassador Zeng further noted that the policy orientation of the two governments is of utmost importance. "Adherence to developing good-neighbourly friendship with Nepal is a set policy of China and it will not change. Similarly, maintaining and developing good relations with China is a focal point of Nepal’s foreign policy."

He further said expanding economic cooperation and promoting common development should be the focal point of Nepal-China relations in future.

The businessmen and entrepreneurs of both the nations should enhance information exchanges and contacts and develop multi-form cooperation, he added.

He asserted that the development of Nepal-China relations needs the joint efforts of the governments and people. People to people contacts are more important for enhancing friendship. He also expressed hope that joint efforts of the two governments and people from both countries would further consolidate the historic ties.

Dr. B.M. Dahal, an executive member of the center stressed the need to further strengthen the relations between two countries.

General secretary of the CSC Dr. Upendra Gautam highlighted the importance of amicable relations between two countries.

Madan Regmi, chairman of the CSC also spoke about the need strengthening ties at people’s level between two countries.

Former SAARC Secretary Yadav Kant Silwal stressed the importance of Nepal-China relations in today’s context urged the scholars to give continuity to such activities so as bolster relations between two countries.

Later Dr. Harka Gurung had presented a working paper on "National Minorities in China," on which MP Dr. Mangal Siddhi Manandhar and Tamla Ukyab, executive member of CSC had commented. Similarly Prof. Hongwei Wang, Director at Beijing Center for South Asian Studies had also presented a working paper on "Sino-Nepali Relation." Prof. Shadmuk Thapa and M. R. Josse a senior journalist had commented on the paper of Prof. Wang.

Around 70 people were participating in the seminar.