Nepali Parliament meeting fails to break peace process deadlock

NEPAL: Nepal’s Maoists and main political parties on Thursday failed to revive their deadlocked peace process, with a special parliamentary session ending after scant debate on the crisis, officials said.

The former rebels called the meeting to push their demands for a total overhaul of the electoral system as well as the immediate abolition of the Himalayan country’s monarchy.

Nepal’s biggest mainstream party, however, said it would continue to block the demands, arguing that the Maoists were straying from the terms of a landmark peace deal they signed 11 months ago to end a decade of civil war.

“Our two demands still stand. We hope this session will establish a new consensus among the parties,” Maoist spokesman Krishna Bahadur Mahara said, before the interim parliament adjourned for a long weekend with no progress made.

The three-hour meeting was instead dominated by debate about a Nepali journalist allegedly abducted by the former rebels, who continue to be accused of using violence and intimidation.

Kathmandu, Friday, AFP