BRIEFS (Spotlight Weekly)

DURING THE FOURTH meeting of the Nepal-China consultative mechanism in Beijing Tuesday, both countries agreed to expedite six project agreements signed during the visit of Chinese Premier Zhu Rongji to Nepal in May. The Foreign Ministry here said a Chinese team is to visit Nepal shortly to make necessary preparations for the implementation of the construction of civil service hospital, Syaprubesi-Rasuwa road and a polytechnic institute, among others. Both sides also agreed that the memorandum of understanding on the implementation plan for outbound travel would be concluded as early possible. "The Chinese side also responded positively to Nepal's request to include Beijing and Xian as two intermediate points and two more points beyond Shanghai for air flights," the ministry said. Foreign Secretary Narayan Shumsher Thapa led the Nepalese delegation at the meeting, whereas Wang Yi, Vice Minister for Foreign Affairs, led the Chinese team.

SIX PEOPLE DIED on the spot and two dozen others were injured when a passenger bus fell about 60 feet off the road in the far-western district of Baitadi early Thursday. The bus was heading toward Baitadi from Mahendranagar. Eyewitnesses said the accident took place as the conductor of the bus was behind the wheels, instead of its driver. The injured are undergoing treatment at a local hospital, police said.

ADDRESSING THE SIXTH International Congress on AIDS in Asia and the Pacific organized in Melbourne early this week, Minister for Health Sharat Singh Bhandari said the Nepalese government is planning to observe 2002 as a year of "HIV/AIDS Awareness and Prevention" by involving people from different walks of life as well as government and NGOs. Meanwhile, a recent international study has identified Nepal as one of the five Asian countries where HIV has begun to spread rapidly. The report published by MAP (Monitoring the AIDS Pandemic Network), a UN-sponsored agency, said the HIV virus has begun to make rapid inroads in Nepal, Indonesia, Iran, Japan and Vietnam. Official figures say little more than 2,000 people have tested HIV-positive in Nepal. Unofficial estimates put the number as high as 70,000.

THE FEDERATION OF NEPALESE Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FNCCI) has set up the Nepal-India Economic Forum (NIEF) to strengthen and increase cooperation between the two neighbors in areas of trade, commerce and economy. The forum is expected to follow a "track two" mechanism to bolster economic ties and promote investment between the two countries, theFNCCI said in a press statement. Headed by Rabi Bhakta Shrestha, president of the FNCCI, the 10-member mechanism will take up issues at the government, private and political levels, the chamber said. The forum will lobby with the Nepalese government on issues related to Indian jointventures operating in Nepal and with the Indian government and other

concerned groupsregarding Nepalese exports and trade. India is the largest investor in Nepal and nearly one third of Nepal's foreign trade is directed toward India. Nepal and China already have a similar mechanism at the private-sector level.

THE GOVERNMENT HAS decided to close down four loss-making Public Enterprises (PEs), a private daily reported. Finance Minister Dr. Ram Sharan Mahat confirmed Tuesday that the government had decided to close down these PEs "as there was no rationale for operating them." The PEs slated for closure include Gharelu Shilpakala Bikri Bhandar, Nepal Transport Corporation, the Timber Corporation of Nepal and Nepal Orind Magnesite Company, Rajdhani daily reported. According to the Finance Ministry, the government has invested more than Rs 7,400 million in 43 PEs in the country but the annual return the government gets is a meager Rs 360 million.

AT LEAST 60 PERCENT of the nearly 127,500 cottage and small industries registered until 1999-2000 are now in dire straits. According to the Federation of Nepalese Cottage and Small Industries (FNCSI), although this sector has only 18 percent of the total industrial investment, it provides 67 percent of the total employment (offered by the industries) and has 80 percent share in the total industrial output. The downward slide of the ëdhaka' and ëpashmina' has discouraged the entrepreneurs. Speakers at a seminar organized in the capital Monday urged the government to act promptly on patent rights and identification of export items. They also demanded that a Cottage and Small Industries Act be formulated and export houses be established at the regional and national level as cooperatives.

THE CENTENARY NOBEL Peace Prize has been awarded to the United Nations and its secretary-general Kofi Annan. "The fight by the man and the institution for global peace belonged center stage as the world plunges into a new war on terrorism. The only negotiable route to global peace and cooperation goes by way of the United Nations," the Norwegian Nobel Committee announced in Oslo Friday. The committee said while Annan had underlined the UN's traditional responsibility for peace and security, he had also led the world body in rising to 'new challenges,' among them international terrorism and the HIV/AIDS epidemic. Responding to the news, Annan said in New York that the prize had brought ëgreat encouragement' but also a challenge to the world body. Similarly, the Swedish Academy's decision to award the Nobel Prize for Literature for 2001 to V.S. Naipaul, a Trinidad-born British writer of Indian origin, has been hailed worldwide.

THE JAPANESE EMBASSY in Kathmandu is to provide financial assistance worth Rs 2.53 million for the construction of a students' hostel in Khumjung school in eastern mountainous district of Solukhumbu under the Grassroots Projects scheme of the Government of Japan. The project will beimplemented by Matsumoto Himalayan Friendship Club, a Japanese NGO. An agreementto this effect was signed between the embassy and the Club here Friday. Sir Edmund Hillary had founded the school in 1960.

ENVIRONMENTALISTS have warned authorities of possible health hazards in connection with the storing of about 74 tonnes of expired and banned pesticides. These pesticides are being stored in different godowns belonging to the state-owned Agriculture Inputs Corporation, Nepal Agriculture Research Center and Cotton Development Board. Greenpeace, an environmental group, said these chemicals are kept in a very poor and unsafe condition in Nepal. Andreas Hans, a German campaigner with the group, said pesticides are both useful as well as harmful. Not only in Nepal, pesticides create problems all over the world. The organization has demanded that the manufacturers and suppliers in countries of origin must take full logistic, technical and financial responsibility for the safe disposal of the waste according to the Stockholm Convention.

NEPAL STOCK EXCHANGE Ltd. (NEPSE), the country's sole bourse, is considering strong action against companies not complying with the existing regulations. General Manager of NEPSE, Mukunda Dhungel, said over 50 percent of the 115 listed companies could be de-listed if they failed to submit key information about their company within a specified time frame. Dhungel said the NEPSE had already finalized the names of the companies to be de-listed but they would be given necessary time to furnish related information. As per the NEPSE Act, the companies must be listed with the NEPSE to issue and transact shares on the NEPSE floor.