Nepal’s former King Gyanendra woke up Thursday as a commoner after leaving his sprawling palace home and army of servants, in line with the abolition of the country’s dynasty.
Last week, Nepal’s new constitutional assembly held its first meeting and put an end to the monarchy, a key part of a 2006 peace deal with Maoist guerrillas who gave up the bullet for the ballot box on the condition that the country becomes a secular republic. The civil war lasted a decade and cost more than 13 000 lives.
The flag of Nepal’s 240-year-old Shah dynasty was taken down from the main palace in Kathmandu on Thursday after legislators abolished the world’s last Hindu monarchy, officials said. "The royal flag was replaced by Nepal’s national flag inside the palace on Thursday morning," a palace official said on condition of anonymity.
Not long ago he was revered as a Hindu god, waited upon by thousands of royal palace retainers. His face crowned banknotes and the national anthem hailed him. Now Nepal’s King Gyanendra is vilified, set to lose his crown and even pay his own tax and electricity bills.
China’s bold plan to take a special Olympic torch to the top of Mount Everest faced a possible setback on Saturday as snow fell on the world’s highest mountain. The climbing team has been at 6 500m in advanced base camp or higher for at least two days, waiting for better weather to take the flame to the 8 848m peak.
A team of mountaineers unveiled plans on Thursday for what could be the most environmentally friendly attempt yet at scaling Everest — where even bodily waste will not be left behind. Expedition leader Dawa Steven Sherpa said his team will road test a "Clean Mountain Can", essentially a very strong, water-tight bucket that can be strapped on to backpacks.
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/ 22 December 2007
Representatives of Nepal’s gay community on Saturday welcomed a decision by the country’s Supreme Court that directed the government to formulate laws for legal recognition of sexual minorities. The laws are to stop discrimination against them, according to the court ruling made on Friday.
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/ 18 September 2007
Maoists stormed out of Nepal’s government and vowed to disrupt upcoming elections on Tuesday after other parties refused to bow to the ex-rebels’ demand for the monarchy to be immediately abolished. In a blow to Nepal’s 10-month-old peace process, the ultra-leftists said they would stage street protests.
Fancy standing on the top of Mount Everest? If you have previous high-mountain experience, an understanding boss and about $40 000 to spare, Russell Brice, a New Zealander and leading Himalayan expedition organiser, can probably help. First conquered in 1953 by Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay, the 8 848m peak has since been scaled about 3 000 times, and this spring season was a record breaker with 530 people getting to the top.
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/ 10 February 2007
Conservationists in Nepal have opened a special ”restaurant” to offer safe food to vultures, whose existence is being threatened from eating carcasses of cattle treated with drugs. Scientists says South Asia’s vultures are on the brink of extinction largely due to farmers dosing their cattle with a drug used to treat inflammation.
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/ 15 January 2007
Nepal’s rebel Maoists were confirmed as members of parliament on Monday as political parties that were once bitter foes brought an end to a decade of civil war, witnesses said. ”Today [Monday] is a day of reconciliation among all the political parties and the people,” Prime Minister Girija Prasad Koirala said in Parliament.
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/ 21 November 2006
Nepal’s Maoist insurgents and interim government signed a landmark peace accord on Tuesday to end a decade of violence that has claimed at least 12 500 lives in the impoverished Himalayan nation. There was applause from hundreds of politicians, diplomats and journalists as rebel leader Prachanda and Prime Minister Girija Prasad Koirala signed off on the deal.
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/ 25 September 2006
A Nepali army rescue team on Monday located the wreckage of a helicopter chartered by conservation group WWF, two days after it went missing in bad weather with 24 people on board, an airport official said. The rescuers saw many bodies at the site, he said.
It took Pushkar Shah, a Nepal native, seven years and nine months to pedal to 100 countries to spread his peace message to the world. And he says his mission is not over yet — despite being mugged twice in the Democratic Republic of Congo, stabbed in Barbados, kidnapped in Mexico and losing his belongings, including having his bicycle stolen in New Zealand.
Since hippies first beat the overland travel trail to Nepal in the 1960s, thousands of foreigners have flocked to monasteries to study Buddhism. Today, despite political upheaval and a decade-long Maoist insurgency, they continue to come and there are more schools than ever, many of which are now home to Westerners who donned Buddhist robes and never left.
Nepal’s interim government announced the long-awaited final names for an 18-member Cabinet on Monday but was immediately rocked when one minister refused to take her post. The top seven jobs were appointed 20 days ago, with 11 more names announced on Monday, including the education, tourism and water-resources portfolios, state-run media said.
Four ministers appointed by Nepal’s king during his 14 months of absolute rule were arrested and detained for 90 days on the orders of the new government on Friday, relatives, police and media said. Former home minister Kamal Thapa, ex-foreign minister Ramesh Nath Pandey and the royal government’s spokesperson Shrish Shumshere Rana were among those rounded up.
Nepal’s Cabinet declared a ceasefire on Wednesday with Maoist rebels and urged them to open peace talks with the government, Deputy Prime Minister Khadga Prasad Oli said. Terrorism-related charges will be dropped against the insurgents, and the government will end its designation of the Maoists as a terrorist group.
Nepal’s path back to democracy turned rocky on Tuesday as political divisions broke into the open and protesters demanded that legislators move faster to ensure the king can never grab power again. New Prime Minister Girija Prasad Koirala announced the core of a new, seven-member Cabinet.
Girija Prasad Koirala was sworn in for his fifth stint as Nepal’s Prime Minister on Sunday in the Himalayan country’s latest step toward democracy. It was the first time that Koirala came face-to-face with King Gyanendra after weeks of protests forced the monarch to give up absolute power.
Waving flags replaced clouds of tear gas as tens of thousands of people in Kathmandu celebrated ”Victory Day” over their king on streets where protesters had fought pitched battles with police. Festivities that started late on Monday after King Gyanendra ended 14 months of absolute rule and restored Parliament, swelled to street parties by mid-morning.
Nepal’s King Gyanendra, who has pledged to ”return sovereignty to the people” after massive and violent street protests, has seen his god-like status badly shaken. Now the question remains whether the wily king can remain on the throne or even whether the monarchy as an institution will survive in the desperately poor nation.
Nepal’s King Gyanendra caved in Friday after two weeks of pro-democracy protests and asked the opposition to name a new prime minister in a speech to the nation. ”We return the executive power of the country to the people,” he said on state-owned Nepal television.
Tens of thousands of protesters marched on the outskirts of the Nepalese capital on Friday, again defying a government-imposed curfew a day after security forces opened fire on demonstrators. An anti-king protester wounded in Thursday’s violence died, raising the death toll for that day to four.
The fight for political control of the Himalayan kingdom of Nepal left at least three people dead and scores injured on Thursday as pro-democracy demonstrators defied a curfew by gathering at the perimeter of the country’s capital to demand an end to royal rule.
Curfew and shoot-on-sight orders have been extended on the Nepalese capital to Friday morning, state television announced. ”The curfew has been extended until 3am on Friday,” said an onscreen strap-line announcement. The royal government had imposed the measure on Kathmandu from 2am Thursday until 8pm to thwart a mass demonstration.
Soldiers and police patrolled Nepal’s capital on Thursday as thousands of protesters from surrounding areas marched toward the city limits, where troops had orders to shoot on sight anyone breaking a curfew. Demonstrators were marching toward Kathmandu from several directions.
Nepal tourist operators on Wednesday forecast grim times ahead for the already ailing sector following the end of a Maoist guerrilla ceasefire in the scenic Himalayan kingdom. A wave of blasts took place after the end on Monday to a four-month truce called by rebels fighting to overthrow the monarchy.
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/ 24 October 2005
Seven French climbers and 11 Nepalese mountain guides were killed in a massive avalanche last week in the north-west of Nepal, the head of the Himalayan Rescue Association said on Monday. The private association sent a 10-member rescue team to find survivors of the October 20 avalanche.
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/ 7 February 2005
Nepal’s new government, headed by King Gyanendra, has offered to hold unconditional talks with Maoist rebels to end an insurgency that has claimed more than 11 000 lives, state media said on Monday. Gyanendra, who controls the army, last week fired the government led by prime minister Sher Bahadur Deuba.
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/ 5 February 2005
When his captors threatened to throw Dhruv Karki into the flashing white swirls of the river Seti, the student activist thought his life was over. Blindfolded and having been beaten with a rifle butt over the past four hours in an army camp in western Nepal, Dhruv was mentally and physically exhausted.
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/ 3 February 2005
Days after seizing power, King Gyandendra moved on Thursday to tighten his grip over Nepal by clamping down on the media — issuing a ban on independent news broadcasts and threatening to punish newspapers for reports that run counter to the official monarchist line. Meanwhile, a Maoist call for a nationwide strike went unheeded.