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KATHMANDU, Dec 2: Nepal reinforced troops fighting an uprising by Maoist insurgents on Sunday as they attacked government installations and a foreign aid agency, officials said.
The Maoists, fighting to replace the impoverished kingdom’s constitutional monarchy with a communist republic, attacked the office of Adventist Development and Relief Agency in Rasuwa, north of Kathmandu, took away office equipment and snapped communication lines.
ADRA, which is headquartered in the United States, helps provide healthcare in Nepal, which lacks basic medical facilities. No-one was injured in the attack, officials said.
The Maoists also attacked a military post near Sundarijal on the outskirts of Kathmandu but were beaten back.
“There was no casualty on the army side in any of these incidents,” the government said.
A government official said troops fired on Maoists who tried to storm a police post at Bhimphendi in central Nepal late on Saturday. “Two rebels, including a woman, were killed and another one was injured,” the official said.
In an interview with the Sunday Times of India, Maoist leader Pushpan Kumar Dahal vowed his group would press on.
Dahal, known as Comrade Prachanda, said the Maoists would suspend violence and sit down for talks only if the government granted people the right to chart their own political future.
“On the contrary, if the lunatic course of imposing military dictatorship is continued, we will fight till this so-called monarchy is completely abolished,” he told the newspaper.
Nepal ordered a state of emergency and called in troops last Monday after the Maoists broke a four-month old truce and attacked security forces in the west and east of the country.
At least 200 people have been killed since then, taking the toll from the uprising to over 2,000 since 1996.
MORE SOLDIERS DEPLOYED: Defence Secretary Padam Kumar Acharya said more soldiers had been sent as efforts intensified to hunt down the insurgents entrenched in thickly forested mountains.
In freezing weather, troops had closed in on the Maoist stronghold of Rolpa in the Himalayan foothills where the rebellion took off in 1996, an official said.
He said helicopters were deployed to pound rebel hideouts in the nearby Jajarkot and Sallyan districts.
RETIRED GURKHA SOLDIERS: Nepal’s army of more than 45,000 includes Gurkha soldiers, famed for their fighting skills, but they have never fought a guerrilla war at home.
The government asked retired Gurkha soldiers for support.
“The Ministry of Defence urges ex-servicemen of the Royal Nepal Army, retired Indian and British Gurkha soldiers for support to the government’s efforts to maintain peace and security in the country,” it said in a statement on Sunday.
It was not clear what kind of support it was seeking.
Officials refused to comment on media reports that two Indian helicopters with night-vision facilities were expected to arrive soon.—Reuters
