THREE PARTIES AGREE TO EXPLORE CONSENSUS UPDATE

THREE PARTIES AGREE TO EXPLORE CONSENSUS UPDATE
Kathmandu, 20 March: Political parties have agreed to continue inter and intra party discussion to explore consensus on contentious issues, when deadline for promulgating the new constitution is fast approaching, RSS reports.

At a meeting with the three major political parties and government at the office State Affairs Committee in Singha Durbar on Tuesday, they agreed to show flexibility to intensify discussions for the peace and constitution-drafting processes, said Constitutional Committee (CC) Chairperson Nilambar Acharya.

It is said that the top leaders of political parties have pledged to move ahead to find solution to the contentious issues of the constitution by bringing the peace process to a conclusion within coming May 27.



The meeting dwelt on the need to discuss on the report of State Restructuring Commission (SRC), intensify discussion to resolve the problems on contentious issues and the period of 15 days to hold discussion on the draft of constitution.

Emerging out of the meeting, UCPN-Maoist Chairperson Pushpa Kamal Dahal said discussion was centralized on taking ahead the tasks of peace and constitution-writing processes simultaneously and it was focused to explore a meeting point on the disputed issues by calling the CC meeting.

Stressing that the disputed issues related to army integration and state restructuring recommended by the SRC should be resolved at the earliest, he said they are ready to move ahead in line with the seven-point deal.

Nepali Congress (NC) Vice-president Ram Chandra Poudel said the meeting zeroed in on promulgating constitution within May 27 by exploring consensus, adding that it would be easier to build understanding on other issues after completing the army integration.

CC Chairperson Nilambar Acharya said the meeting was called find consensus on thorny issues of peace and constitution and draw attention of the parties to conclude the issue of federalism as recommended by SRC.

Present at the meeting were leaders including Dahal and Dev Prasad Gurung from the UCPN (Maoist), Poudel and Laxman Prasad Ghimire from the Nepali Congress, and Jhalanath Khanal and Bhim Acharya from the CPN-UML.
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