GREETINGS EXTNDED FOR NEW YEAR YEAR BY PARTY LEADERS

GREETINGS EXTENDED FOR NEW YEAR BY PARTY LEADERS
Kathmandu, 13 April: Nepali Congress President Sushil Koirala has extended best wishes for happiness, peace and prosperity of entire Nepali brothers and sisters on the happy occasion of New Year-2069, RSS reports.
In a greetings message on the occasion, Koirala said every New Year enables us to work in favor of the country and people in the coming days by reviewing and analysing the past works.
Entire citizenry should get a feeling that their right to life and property, freedom of press, protection of human rights, independent judiciary, end to impunity, return of seized property to the rightful owners, rehabilitation of conflict victims and displaced have been genuinely addressed in the New Year, said Koirala.
He further said the recent decision of the army integration special committee (AISC) to put the Maoist combatants, weapons and their cantonments under the preview of national army will pave the way for taking ahead the peace process to positive direction.
Likewise, NC Vice-president and parliamentary party leader Ram Chandra Poudel has wished for peace, progress, prosperity of all Nepali people in and outside the country on the occasion.
May the advent of New Year instill encouragement and success in materializing the dream of establishing lasting peace, constitution and democracy, states a greeting message issued by leader Poudel.
Similarly, former Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba also expressed best compliments for the peace, progress and prosperity to all Nepali brothers and sisters in the country and abroad.
The latest decision on the peace process has made all of us excited, he said, adding that the move has provided us with additional inspiration to establish lasting peace in the country.
On the occasion, Chairperson of Rastriya Janashakti Party and former Prime Minister Surya Bahadur Thapa extended his best wishes for peace, progress, prosperity, good health, unity and harmony to all Nepali brothers and sisters in and outside the country.
Likewise, Chairperson of Human Rights Organizations of Nepal (HURON) Sudip Pathak also extended greetings on the happy occasion of New Year.
May the New Year make industry; business, educational and transportation sector the peace and violence-free zone, end the situation to get burnt alive on the charge of practicing witchcraft and have the state made necessary arrangements for conflict survivors and families of the enforced disappeared, he said through greetings
message.
nnnn
CONSUMER CARDS SOON FOR LPG GAS CYLINDERS
Kathmandu, 13 April: Consumers will get ‘liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) consumer cards’ by the third week of April. The Nepal Oil Corporation (NOC) has said the card distribution will start within ‘four-five days’, The Kathmandu Postreports.
NOC Acting General Manager Suresh Kumar Agrawal said the corporation would issue a public notice on Sunday in this regard. “We will start the distribution by Monday or Tuesday,” Agrawal said.
The cards will reach to the consumers through dealers and retailers, according to NOC.
The state-owned oil monopoly had decided to introduce LPG cards so as to regulate the distribution channel and ensure smooth supply. NOC has readied four million such cards.
NOC is introducing two types of LPG users’ cards—red and blue. The red card will be issued to household users, while the blue one to industrial users. Of the total cards, 1.5 million are blue and the rest red.
NOC said it differentiated the cards on the basis of the statistics that 30 percent of LPG cylinders are used for industrial purposes. After distributing the cards, NOC plans to sell LPG cylinders to industries (blue card holders) at cost price.
The cost price of an LPG cylinder is Rs 2,217, but the corporation is selling at a subsidised Rs 1,415.
According to NOC, the profit raised from LPG sold to industries will be used to provide subsidy to the poor and students. At present, entrepreneurs are offered VAT refunds on LPG.
The introduction of the card means only the card holders can purchase LPG cylinders. LPG bottlers, dealers, and retailers should provide all their sales record to NOC timely.
Blue cards will bear the PAN number of entrepreneurs, while the red ones will have general people’s citizenship number and the number of family members.
Kush Kumar Malli, general secretary of Nepal LPG Industries’ Association, said termed the government’s move ‘good’, saying that there was a need to differentiate LPG users. “As NOC is always incurring losses in LPGs, the provision means that industrial users have to pay the cost price which will compensate NOC’s losses that it has to bear while selling LPG to general consumers,” he said.
As the provision is new to Nepal, some problem might emerge initially while implementing, said Malli. “The problems should be addressed gradually.
Government officials said introduction of LPG cards will help keep distribution and consumer records up to date. Most importantly, it will maintain transparency in distribution channel, they said.
LPG consumption increased eight-fold over the last 14 years, according to NOC statistics. The statistics show that LPG consumption started rising after 2007-08, when import surged by almost 20 percent.
nnnn




NORTH KOREAN ROCKET LAUNCH FAILS
Kathmandu, 13 April: News of North Korea's abortive rocket launch was flashed around the world Friday but there were four long hours of silence before Pyongyang admitted the highly publicised attempt had failed, AFP reports .from Pyongyang.

"The earth observation satellite failed to enter its preset orbit. Scientists, technicians and experts are now looking into the cause of the failure," the KCNA official news agency finally said in a terse report.

But there was still no word from officials on the ground for scores of foreign journalists invited by the normally secretive state to witness what was touted as a historic occasion.

The United States and many other nations have condemned the launch as a pretext for testing banned ballistic missile technology.

But the nuclear-armed North, which normally tightly restricts media visits, threw its doors open to emphasise what it called its peaceful intentions in space.

Last Sunday it gave many of them an unprecedented visit to the Tongchang-ri space centre in the country's northwest, where they saw the satellite and the Unha-3 rocket.

On Wednesday they were treated to another ground-breaking visit to the mission control centre in a suburb north of the capital.

During both visits, local media filmed and photographed the journalists.

State television station KRT has frequently broadcast those images, with a commentary saying the foreign reporters were convinced that North Korea would carry out a civilian satellite launch.

But blast-off, first reported by South Korean news outlets, took journalists billeted at Pyongyang's luxury Yanggakdo International Hotel by surprise.

At a specially outfitted media centre in a circular conference room, TV crews and cameramen had set up about a dozen tripods facing a huge white screen which was installed Thursday.

But the centre was almost empty when the news broke from Seoul, and the screen remained blank.

The launch was to have been the centrepiece of mass celebrations marking the 100th anniversary on Sunday of the birth of founding leader Kim Il-Sung.

The impoverished nation, which suffers persistent food and electricity shortages, spent hundreds of millions of dollars on the launch, according to South Korean officials.

The luxury hotel on an island in the Taedong River contrasts with the utilitarian concrete apartment blocks which make up much of the city.

A restaurant on the 47th floor offers a panoramic night-time view -- of a largely darkened metropolis.

In a nation whose leaders are shrouded in a personality cult, the hotel bookshop offers only the works of Kim Il-Sung and his successor Kim Jong-Il, textbooks on the Kimjongilia national flower and similar laudatory material.

Launch failures may be embarrassing, but they are not uncommon even for wealthy and technologically advanced nations.

Christian Lardier, space editor at France's Air and Cosmos magazine, estimated there were an average 75 satellite launch attempts every year worldwide.

Each year there were four or five failures, he told AFP in Pyongyang.

But the North, other analysts said, was likely to be chastened by the failure given its extensive publicity build-up.

"Obviously the rocket launch is pretty embarrassing for Kim Jung-Un and North Korea," said Tate Nurkin, managing director at leading defence publication IHS Jane's.

Kim Jong-Un, grandson of Kim Il-Sung, is working to bolster his authority after taking over power when his own father Kim Jong-Il died last December.

Given the advance publicity "it is hard to imagine a greater humiliation", wrote North Korea expert Marcus Noland on the blog of the Peterson Institute for International Economics.

"Some of the scientists and engineers associated with the launch are likely facing death or the gulag as scapegoats for this embarrassment."
nnnn