Endless Violence
THE continuing violence unleashed by the Maoists has come in
for a yet another condemnation by Nepal's development partners. In a pass release on
Wednesday, the European Union has blasted what it called the increasing outrages of the
Maoists insurgents in Nepal and called on them to immediately stop the violence campaign.
The EU, the statement said, unreservedly condemned the ongoing insurgency and called on
the Maoists to immediately stop the systematic campaign of killing, harassment and
destruction. Previously too, the EU has time and again called on the Maoists to stop their
mindless violence campaign and asked them to enter into negotiations and find a peaceful
solution to the problem. This call has fallen on deaf ears. What is particularly
reprehensible is that despite a recent pledge by the Maoists to put a halt to killing of
party activists and sabotage of physical infrastructure, Maoists across the country has
continued their spree of killing innocent people and bombing public and bombing public
infrastructures. Such a contradiction between what the Maoists have said and what they are
doing naturally raises the question of whether the government and the people of Nepal
could take word from them seriously. There has been no explanation from the Maoists as to
such inconsistency persists. If they were sincere about their call for a halt to killing
of innocent people and destruction of public infrastructure, it should have been
demonstrated through action, rather inaction, on the ground. But unfortunately for all
practical purposes, seen against the continued violence, that call seems to have been made
as a propaganda ploy.
The EU statement, issued by the Royal Danish Embassy which
holds the presidency of the EU, also took note of the increasing awareness by the Nepalese
authorities of human rights violations by the security forces and of their commitment to
halt such violations and hoped that the security forces would achieve its objectives with
regard to improving their human rights record. The government must try harder to fulfill
the commitments it has made to respect human rights to ensure that the innocents are not
caught in the battle against the Maoists. The stress by the EU, which is Nepal's important
development partner, on an assertive reform and development agenda should also be
interpreted as its desire to see that the national issues like poverty, exclusion and
discrimination, poor governance and corruption are mitigated. But as it rightly said such
reforms cannot be carried out in the kind of atmosphere Nepal is under. Thus better sense
must prevail upon Maoists and they should stop this endless violence and accept the
government's offer for talks sincerely. They must heed the government's and Nepal's
development partners to find a peaceful solution to the conflict.
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