TWO MEMBERS SNAP TIES WITH TRANSOTIONAL JUSTICE TEAMS

TWO MEMBERS DISASSOCIATE THEMSELVES FROM TRANSITIONAL
JUSTICE MECHANISMS
Kathmandu, 19 Dec.: Two key members of a core team that was giving final touches to the bills on transitional justice mechanisms have "dissociated" themselves from the process following a decision at the "political level" to scrap the provision on prosecution altogether, The Kathmandu Post reports.
Nepali Congress (NC) leader and advocate Radheshyam Adhikari and CPN-UML lawmaker and advocate Agni Kharel confirmed they have disassociated themselves from the discussions.
Refusing to elaborate on why he took the decision, Adhikari said, "I left for personal reasons." Now, Ramesh Lekhak is the only representative in the taskforce from the NC.
Sources privy to the discussions on the bill on the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) said Adhikari quit mainly due to the political decision to scrap the provision of prosecution and go for blanket amnesty.
"Some had stopped attending the taskforce meetings much earlier when it came to light that the parties were headed for amnesty," a source said. "Actually, they neither want to take the ownership of the weak bills nor do they dare to oppose the move."
CPN-UML leader Pradeep Gyawali, a member of the taskforce, said the bills will try to ensure prosecution for some serious crimes irrespective of the reported agreement between the Maoist and NC top brass. "We cannot comment on what the top leaders of the NC and the Maoist party agreed on, but I will not agree to scrap the prosecution part altogether from the bills," he said.
Other leaders in the taskforce, however, said the bills cannot prosecute anyone given the agreement in the Constituent Assembly sub-committee to not allow the state to formulate any retrospective law to prosecute any crime committed during the conflict period.
"The pending bills will be automatically invalid if they contain provisions for prosecution," a Maoist leader said.
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PARTIES DIVIDED ON WAYS TO REDUCE PLA NUMBERS
Kathmandu, 19 Dec.: Differences between the Maoist and non-Maoist parties over the determination of ranks to be conferred on former Maoist combatants opting for integration into the Nepal Army are likely to delay the commencement of the army integration process, Phanindra Dahal writes n The Kathmandu Post..
Of the 17,074 People's Liberation Army (PLA) combatants participating in the regrouping process, over 9,700 have adopted for integration. Around 3,200 combatants will have to switch their interest from integration to voluntary retirement in order to meet the agreed 6,500 limit in the number of former rebel soldiers in the non-combat directorate to be formed under the Nepal Army.
Maoist leaders have said some senior commanders will go for voluntary retirement once the senior-most rank to be offered to the combatants is decided at the political level. “The number of integration aspirants will not fall significantly even if the rank is determined. So there has to be an agreement to integrate combatants above the 6,500 limit to the Nepal Police and the Armed Police Force,” said Chandra Prakash Khanal, PLA deputy commander and secretariat member of the prime minister-led Special Committee overseeing the integration process.
Opposition leaders argue that there is no possibility of political decision on rank determination. “The Nepal Army will test the qualification of combatants on individual basis and allocate ranks based on its standard norms,” said Nepali Congress leader and Special Committee member Ram Sharan Mahat.
According to him, there are three ways of bringing down the number of combatants opting for integration. One of them is for the combatants to voluntarily give up their preference as they were asked to choose integration in order to inflate the number of Nepal Army post aspirants. The screening of combatants by the Army would also bring down the numbers. “When the Nepal Army decides on the rank at last, some combatants will change their stance taken during the regrouping process,” said the NC leader.
The UCPN (Maoist) has said a panel comprising representatives from the Nepal Army, the PLA and experts should be formed to monitor the integration process before its execution. The bridge course and methods of selecting combatants should also be determined on the basis of consensus, according to PLA Spokesman Khanal.
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