Asia Times Online - A fight to the death in Nepal

By Dhruba Adhikary

KATHMANDU - Anyone going through literature put out by the Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist) will understand that the ultimate aim of the "People's War", launched in early 1996, is to convert the Himalayan kingdom into a state run by the believers of Marxism-Leninism-Maoism.

Their Internet web site places Prachanda, their supremo who goes with one name, on a par with Karl Marx, Vladimir Lenin and Mao Zedong. And the Nepali expression of the "Prachanda Path" is made to appear comparable to the Shining Path movement in Peru. Baburam Bhattarai, one of the leader's right-hand men, used to cite the Peruvian insurgency as a possible role model for Nepal. Bhattarai was at the forefront of the activists who, in 1992, collected signatures from Nepal's members of parliament who subsequently urged the authorities in Lima to release Abimael Guzman, or Chairman Gonzalo.

It appears that Nepali Maoists continue to take advantage from their linkages with RIM (the Revolutionary International Movement), which was instrumental in introducing them to comrades from other parts of the world, including those in India and Turkey.

While their eventual plan is the abolition of Nepal's monarchy, the methods employed by the Maoists to achieve this goal have been violent from the beginning. And they are open on this count. Their belief in Mao's words are exemplified by Chinese leader Mao Zedong's slogan that leads their web site: "Political power grows out of the barrel of a gun."

Guns seem to be more important to Maoists than men who handle these weapons. Incidents over the years indicate that the guerrillas prefer to lose their men - and now an increasing number of women - rather than the rifles that they manage to snatch from the army and the police. Lately, they have begun procuring small arms from various sources in India, which shares an 1,800-plus kilometers of unregulated land border with Nepal.

The Maoists' declared ideology depicts them as communists and their violent methods project them as terrorists, which does not sit well with countries more tuned to Western democratic systems. India certainly has not taken the phenomenon as something easily digestible. New Delhi termed Nepal's Maoists as terrorists even before Kathmandu took a decision on the issue. Indian authorities apparently reacted to the Maoist denunciation of India as an "expansionist" power.

Like other communist groups, the Maoists accuse the United States of being a power with "imperialist" designs, and their wrath against the US has found expression in different forms. Fatal attacks on two US embassy guards in Kathmandu, the killing of Rabindra Shrestha, a Nepali national who worked as an agricultural specialist in a US-aided project in the western hill district of Salyan, and hits on two Coca-Cola plants elsewhere in the country are some of the examples of their displeasure with the US.

The United Kingdom, which regards Nepal as a traditional ally in South Asia, mainly due to the Gurkha connection, castigates Maoists for adopting violent measures to attain their political goals. Conspicuously though, Maoists have not inflicted any physical harm on personnel, projects or properties belonging to either India or Britain. The incident of October 19 was an exception when rebels abducted a British army officer trekking in the Baglung area on the western hills. Two days later he was released, and Prachanda himself took the unprecedented step of issuing a public apology - from his underground hideout - over the incident.

More than 8,000 lives have been lost in eight years and, according to figures released on Tuesday, over 1,200 deaths have occurred in the period since the collapse of the latest ceasefire on August 27. Informal Sector Education Center, a human rights group, also says that citizens have been killed by both Maoists and security forces consisting of personnel from the Royal Nepal Army, the Nepal Police and the Armed Police Force.

Maoist rebels, who now are spread in all 75 districts of the country, continue to kill people who either do not make financial contributions or who show unwillingness to feed their workers or who act as informers to the police or army. School teachers, journalists and government officials have been murdered, often by slitting heads from bodies. In the absence of a credible security cover, people in rural areas are unable to offer any resistance.

And apart from the loss of lives, the insurgency has already cost the country dearly in economic terms, and the destruction of infrastructures has inflicted additional damage to Nepal's farm-based subsistence economy.

The Maoists claim - and authorities agree in private conversations - that the presence of government authority is effectively confined to district headquarters. This means that the largest part of the country's 23 million population is left unattended. To Maoists, this is a major gain as it provides them a basis for propaganda that about 80 percent of Nepal is already under their control.

The present spell is a phase of uncertainty, with a weak civilian government in Kathmandu trying to be assertive through military action. It is a period that has evolved after several rounds of peace talks held between 2001 and 2003 failed to produce tangible results in terms of the political reforms that the Maoists demanded. Rebel leaders, who have gone underground since the collapse of negotiations in August, have blamed the "old regime" for remaining adamant, even after the Maoists' willingness to be flexible in their demands submitted on behalf of the poor and down-trodden sections of the population.

A round-table meeting of both communist and non-communist political forces, the formation of an all-party interim government and the holding of elections for a constituent assembly (for writing a new constitution to replace the one enacted in 1990) are the three main demands put forward by the Maoists.

Media reports and comments indicate that King Gyanendra is averse to a constituent assembly, fearing for the future of the monarchy. The Maoists have repeatedly said in clear terms that the feudal institution of the monarchy would not have any place in their political scheme. Actually, from their standpoint, the era of the monarchy effectively came on June 1, 2001 - the day that King Birendra, together with the queen and crown prince, were killed in a palace shootout, the details of which remain a mystery.

In any case, what will happen if most of the other political parties, which the monarch alienated by dismissing an elected government in October 2002, also agree to be supportive to the Maoists on this issue? Nobody can ignore this question.

Military sources claim that the Maoists have suffered a major setback in recent weeks, losing hundreds of fighters. Attacks carried out by insurgent groups on police posts and other government installations were foiled by security forces, who have also been successful in retrieving some of the weapons the rebels have seized in the past.

The Maoists, however, rebuff these assertions, and it is difficult to independently verify who among the belligerent parties is speaking the truth. Officers commanding the field operations believe that they will reduce the rebel strength before long, provided the civilian authorities in Kathmandu do not once again fall into the Maoist trap of another round of negotiations. The military want the political leadership to understand what the Maoists did during previous peace talks - they used them to buy time to re-group and augment their fighting capabilities.

The security forces are emboldened by the latest statement of Surya Bahadur Thapa, who heads the government appointed by the king. Thapa said that he would not consider any other option until the military strength of the Maoists was reduced to a minimum level.

The latest US action to freeze the assets of the Maoists needs to be examined against this background. Although the US envoy in Kathmandu, Michael Malinowski, has likened Maoist tactics to those of Cambodia's infamous Khmer Rouge, Washington had not taken any direct measures on them thus far. It was only in March that Washington placed them on a secondary (watch) list of organizations whose activities could be harmful to American interests.

And the US decision of October 31 to declare the Maoists a threat to US security came shortly after the rebel organization issued a statement outlining its new strategy. This, signed by Prachanda, was issued on October 20 with a pledge not to harm the activities of non-government organizations, except those run with US support.

Washington responded in kind by issuing an executive order from Secretary of State Colin Powell to freeze Maoists' assets. A Washington Post report on November 7, however, described the measure as a " largely symbolic move". What carries more than a symbolic significance is the US appeal to other countries to take similar steps.

India rightly acknowledged that it is the most important among such "other countries". But the Indian envoy in Kathmandu, Shyam Saran, did not lose any time in telling the US audience that New Delhi was unlikely to extend any meaningful cooperation on the matter. "The US has its way of dealing with such matters, while India has its own way of doing things."

The responses differ because the interests and perceptions of the countries are divergent. Shyam Saran denied having any knowledge of Maoists maintaining bank accounts in India. This kind of response can undoubtedly stand on legal and technical grounds, but it cannot convince the public at large. And if Maoist insurgency, for instance, is a "common threat", as has been mentioned by the ambassador, should not New Delhi help Kathmandu to devise a strategy to uncover the sources of its funding?

Indeed, Indian authorities have dealt with the case of the Maoists differently on different occasions. First, Indian security agencies did not prevent the Maoists from holding a conference in Siliguri, a township in the state of West Bengal. Secondly, Maoist leader Krishna Bahadur Mahara safely granted a television interview to a Western network from an undisclosed location in New Delhi. The case of Chandra Prakash Gajurel, another senior member of the Maoist leadership, is equally intriguing. Gajurel was detained by Indian police in August at Chennai airport when he was about to board a Europe-bound plane, on charges of using forged British travel documents. But Indian authorities refused to transfer him to Nepal, though they have in the past handed back field-level Maoist workers, often picked up from hospitals they visit for treatment of minor injuries.

The standard reaction from New Delhi on Nepal's complaints on such matters is invariably based on two arguments: that India is a democracy and cannot therefore apply restrictive laws on people residing in Indian territory, and that the border between Nepal and India is open - meaning unregulated. But such contentions remain unconvincing, even to those Indians who have actively worked to implement New Delhi's external relations for a long time.

The following observation of K V Rajan, Indian ambassador to Nepal from 1995 to 2000, is illuminating:

"To plead that it is difficult to keep track of such [Maoist] activity because of an open border is to give credibility to the same argument made by Nepal in defense of its inability to prevent cross-border traffic of criminals and terrorists."

The Maoists also have found it expedient to reciprocate whatever covert support they receive from India. For example, they no longer criticize India, let alone harm Indian interests in Nepal. No point is raised, even when border areas are encroached, high dams are constructed causing inundation in Nepali territory, Nepali nationals mistreated in Indian towns and Nepal is short-changed in agreements to utilize water flowing from the rivers of Nepal. Instead, the Maoists prefer to use their weight to denounce the US, a country located on the other side of the world; a country which is unlikely to colonize or usurp Nepal. China, Nepal's neighbor to the north, too, is not considered a menace by Nepalis.

Meanwhile, while Britain continues to be a part of the US-led alliance against terrorism in a global context, it holds a different viewpoint on Nepal's Maoists. Although Nepal's military continues to receive "non-lethal" assistance from the UK, the British stand is that there is no military solution to the ongoing insurgency. They also share some of the views of European partners, whose concerns are primarily focused on socio-economic reforms and on human rights issues. Reports of excesses committed by security forces, mainly by the army, have come under the close scrutiny of some European countries, including Germany, Switzerland and Norway.

It seems, then, that Western sympathy for the Maoists is on the decline because the Maoists themselves have failed to maintain their image as saviours of the poor and socially-disadvantaged groups. In their attempts to change tactics from time to time, the Maoist leadership has lost its grip on its own cadres. Members of rebel militia units have begun to defy orders from the top. This trend has been particularly visible since the Maoists announced a nine-day unilateral ceasefire during the Dashain festival last month. Media reports say that Maoists in villages did not stop their killing spree, and they also reported other activities, such as looting, extortion and rape.

Mohan Bikram Singh, a strong personality in Nepal's communist movement since the 1950s, is of the view that the "People's War" is an extremism, a terrorist idea, which can be exploited by the monarchy to regain the absolute powers it lost during the pro-democracy movement of 1990.

Would the Maoists be prepared to abandon the insurgency if they were to receive an offer for sharing power with the present regime and take the country to fresh elections? No, according to Baburam Bhattarai, a rebel leader. "There is just no chance of our sharing the spoils of power within the present autocratic monarchical system, whether through showcase 'elections' or no elections," Bhattarai wrote in a newspaper in July.

There's clearly no end in sight for Nepal's turmoil. Sphere: Related Content