Why Maoists want third party mediation?

Dr. Bishnu Raj Uprety, PhD. Conflict Management

Question of third party mediation

Nepalese history shows that Nepal was a successful international mediator in resolving conflict of British-India with China and Russia and. Prem Raman Upreti says that Jit Bahadur K.C., a resident representative of Nepalese government (Okeel at that time-equivalent to ambassador now) had played crucial role to mediate conflict between China and Tibet in 1912-14. He was able to return Chinese troops from Tibet and to reinstall the then exiled Dalai Lama (who was in India, but not the current Dalai Lama). Similarly, he had mediated between the British India and Russia. When Russians came to construct roads and infrastructures in China close to Indian borders, British India objected and a severe conflict emerged. Mr K.C. negotiated between these two powers and Russians returned. According to Mr P. R. Upreti, Lord Corzon representing Britain in India (who became British Foreign Minister later) had highly appreciated the ability of Mr Jit Bahadur KC. Now we are looking for extern mediator for our own conflict.

Regarding the third party mediation, the obvious question is has Nepal exhausted all domestic mediation efforts before going to external options? Experiences of the past eight years reveal that Nepal need external support in negotiated settlement.

Analysing the documents and expressions of warring parties and monitoring of the media, it can be safely said that both parties are looking for external guarantors. Repeated expressions of the Maoists to engage UN in negotiated settlement is a clear reflection of their desire to have guarantee from neutral international force. Their willingness to invite UN, in my opinion, should not be understood only as their attempt to get international recognition. Even if they get international recognition while involving the UN, which solves the problem, there is no any harm. The important issue is to solve the problems, not whether Maoists get recognitions. Further, when the Maoists get international recognition, this may force them to comply with international provisions and to settle the armed conflict politically.

 Who can be the guarantor in negotiated settlement is a major concern. Several potential guarantors are available such as India, China, Scandinavian countries, Switzerland, UN, EU, ICRC, Centre for Humanitarian Dialogue, Carter Centre. However, obvious questions are: Are warring parties ready to accept? What are the model and level of their engagement? Is there any possibility of combined engagement of more than one guarantor? Is there any possibility of joint effort of India and China to be guarantor? Will India be interested to work with UN in resolving conflict?

Prospects of third party mediation in Nepal

Nepal is a country supported by many bilateral nations, inter-governmental and international non-governmental organisations with good intentions. They want to help Nepal at the time of crisis. The recent NDF meeting (5-6 May 2004) has clearly demonstrated their commitment and concerns toward Nepal. In this meeting, they had emphasised to restore peace and institute democratically elected government as basis of their support. In this context, Praful Patel, Vice president of World Bank South Asia Region Said, "We are committed to support PRSP, but had the peace process and democratic process prevailed in the country, Nepal could have secured more assistance"

There are mainly three types of external involvements in resolving domestic conflict around the world depending upon the nature and intensity of the conflict. First is soft approach, i.e., political and diplomatic involvement of external actors with the warring parties of the host country to settle the ongoing conflict. Second approach is through international courts and other binding legal arrangements, which are not so common in a domestic conflict. The third approach is more hardcore intervention of military force, which often goes through UN Security Council's resolution or forceful intervention by powerful nations (Upreti, 2004). But, in the context of Nepal, the debate on need of external mediation is absolutely related to the first approach, i.e., political and diplomatic involvement.

Whether external or internal, mediation is effective at a time when the fighting parties are willing to reassess their policies. They do so when they:

Fall in to stalemate, which is mutually hurting, i.e., when each party realises that it is un-winnable and stalemate is costly, not bearable.

Realise the catastrophic escalation leading to impending crisis, which they cannot afford to suffer (Zartman and Touvel, 1996).

Hence, ripeness of conflict, in other word timing, is extremely important in mediating conflict. Repeated expressions of the government ministers and RNA about their confidence to disarm the Maoists are important underlying reasons of their resistance to external mediation.

We have past experiences of external mediation. In the past India had mediated our domestic conflict several times (e.g., 1950 Delhi agreement, Indian army intervention in K. I. Singh revolt, etc), and negotiated over water resource conflict related to Koshi, Gandak and Mahakali treaties and understanding on Upper Karnali, but the stakes were very high in all mediations and Nepal had to always lose from these negotiation and mediations.

Why Maoists want third party mediation?

They are repeatedly saying that they accept neutral third party mediation and the UN is their obvious choice. There could be several reasons for the Maoists preference to external mediation:

They do not trust the government, particularly the Royal Nepal Army. Their expressions indicate that they are very suspicious of RNA after the 5 KM controversy in last year's negotiation and the Doramba killing. Hence, they might want guarantee from a legitimate and neutral international power.

International involvement also gives legitimacy and recognition to their rebellion. This might be another motivating factor for the Maoists to advocate the involvement of the UN. Some Nepalese scholars resist UN's political mediation mainly based on the argument that it legitimises Maoists proposition of 'new regime v/s old regime'. But this is unfounded fear. Even if they get legitimacy, at the end there should be negotiated settlement. Therefore, the issue of legitimacy seems irrelevant.

Perhaps another and most important reason might be to give impression to the international community that they are committed to negotiated agreement. Further, they might be expecting to rule the country and therefore want to demonstrate their openness and to establish international relations for future political and diplomatic course of actions and financial support.

Why the government is reluctant to third party mediation?

The unique geo-political situation of Nepal has direct consequence of involving international mediators. Whoever may be at the helm, the influence of the Indian interests is overtly or covertly reflected in the actions and behaviour of the government and even the governing political parties. The only exceptions were the 1989 Trade and Transit Treaty related position of Nepal and the strong stand of the UML government under the leadership of Manamohan Adhikari on 1950 Treaty. Whether it is openly acknowledged or not, Indian influence is expanded even in changing government, selecting prime minister, ministers and filling other powerful positions. The fundamental reason of the repeated denial of the Nepalese governments to involve the UN or other neutral third party for mediation has been clearly revealed by the then foreign Minister Bhesh Bahadur Thapa. He publicly declared that Nepal could not bypass the powerful neighbouring countries to invite the UN or other third parties for mediation of the armed conflict. Pragmatically, India does not want to see any outsider being active in Nepalese armed conflict. Considering itself as a regional power, it wants to handle all the issues arising in South Asia by itself. Another worry for India is the growing expansion of Maoist insurgencies in different states of India. Indian Maoists may have developed their confidence from the growth and expansion of the Nepalese Maoists. If a third party mediates Nepalese conflict, this factor may not get attention, which is an important security concern for India.

Comparatively, China is less actively engaged in the debate of negotiation of armed conflict than India. However, it has occasionally expressed that the armed conflict is internal problem of Nepal and it can handle itself. This indicates the reluctance of China to accept international mediators. There are some strong underlying reasons of Indian and Chinese interests in Nepalese politics. China is much concerned about the Tibetan issue and it does not want to see any force engaged in discussion and debate about the independence of Tibet. Therefore, Chinese scrutiny about the international involvement in mediating armed conflict in Nepal concentrates on the Tibetan issue. Another concern of China in relation to international mediation of Nepalese conflict is its security concern, particularly in a situation when bilateral or multi-lateral security forces enter Nepal on a peacekeeping mission or for helping the failed nation. Evidences of so-called failed nations show that external powers make all domestic policies, based on their interests. This is another possible reason why China is not supporting the international involvement.

There are always invisible forces involved in trading of small arm and light weapons to maintain or escalate war for the commercial benefit and their strategy might influence the government decision makers. This hidden but powerful force might have strong influence over the key players within the government who deny the involvement of third party mediation because it hampers ill intention and minimises manoeuvring and manipulation during the negotiation process if the experienced professional and independent mediators are involved.

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